The Good Life, After Death
by Semi-Functional Eraser
Summary: Otto Octavius stole the life of Peter Parker. He did him a favor. PeterxMulti. Post Superior.
1. Chapter 1

**After reading many stories in other fandoms where the protagonist gets a new lease on life and changes their ways, I asked myself why can't Spider-Man? Thus, this… oddity, began.**

 **Synopsis: Otto Octavius stole the life of Peter Parker. He did him a favor. PeterxMulti, contains a distaste for Superior.**

 **Rated M: For mature themes and language.**

* * *

The last thing I remember about being dead is opening my eyes.

Doctor Strange thought he was doing me a favor, bringing me back. The whole, "You have a life to live, a good life," type deal. "You deserve to have it back."

His words' sincerity was somewhat lost considering how guilty he must have felt. If it was as guilty as he looked, then it was a lot. I don't blame him - he only managed to find out that I wasn't actually me, and I was actually dead… after I'd been killed. Bit slow on the uptake.

But hey, that's life! More accurately, that was the Parker luck, Chuck.

The good Doctor thought he was doing the right thing bringing me back to life and to be honest, it took being dead to realize just how tired I was of being alive. This was due in no small part to to the fact that, what life there was left for me was in ruins now, after having it stolen and destroyed.

My name is Peter Parker, and I miss being dead.

…Wait, that sounds Strange. Sorry, Doctor Strange. Let me reiterate: "My name is Peter Parker, and being dead was the most fun I'd had in a long, _long_ time." That sounds better.

I'm Spider-Man, the love him, hate him, now mostly _Hate_ him with a capital H, run away from him vigilante of New York. Or at least, I had been. For over ten years. Nonstop. If I was a soldier that'd be over a decade of active duty. Maybe then I'd get more respect.

I _was_ Spider-Man, but not anymore. I've hung up the threads a few times in my years, and saying that makes me sound a lot older than twenty six, but it's true. Putting your life on the line for so long does wonders to age you, as it turns out.

This time, though, I meant it… at least for a while. I was _done_ being Spider-Man, and for that matter, done being _Peter Parker,_ too. As far as I was concerned, they both died a year ago, murdered by the man who stole my body, and my life. His name was Otto Octavius.

On his resume, you'd now find _'Asshat_ of the _century_!' and 'Held the entire world hostage for his own ego!' Now, those are two pretty impressive accomplishments.

Even Doom only held the 'Jackass of the Week' award, though that was because he extradited the person who put that on _his_ resume. No one denies DOOM the right to be Jackass of the _Year_.

Anyways, I hope he's doing the Salsa dance with whoever with a pineapple and a pine up where the sun don't shine.

But it occurs to me that I missed my twenty-fifth birthday because of him. Thanks, life! Make that two pines. Then again, I would guess it's pretty difficult receive a prickly fruit enema while in nonexistence.

I kid… but not really. I thought that most of my anger had faded, at the very least at Otto. We had… talked. And by talked, I mean with fists. My fists. Very soothing.

It helps that I know for a fact that he's nowhere pleasant for what he's done. He killed Peter Parker. Not the only person he's killed, but he did wear his body like a _suit_ and ruined his life, so it's only fair that Parker would get an honorable mention, if nothing else.

Peter Parker had gotten his doctorate. Not me. Peter Parker started dating Anna Maria Marconi. Not me, though I continued that with righteous enjoyment.

Peter Parker abandoned Horizon labs. He, the Superior Spider-Man, held the city hostage ( _some_ people never change) and lost all trust the Amazing Spider-Man earned from just about everyone in his long career.

He made enemies of the Avengers, caused heroes all over New York to question and distrust Spider-Man along with the city at large. He ostracized the man Parker had come to know as his only living sibling, his brother, just when they were out of the darkness and Kaine Parker was ready to _live_.

Peter Parker, what a schmuck. That guy was on a _roll_. But not me. That was 'Peter Parker', the 'Superior' Spider-Man.

Me? I was Peter Parker: dead and loving it.

* * *

I would say I resigned myself to death, but that is a bad word. It makes it sound like I 'gave up'.

I _didn't_ give up. Ever. I complained and whined, as the years went on, I got cynical, gabby, but I never gave up. I told jokes, but not to mask fear after a while – I'd been at it for over ten years. To say I was jaded and desensitized is akin to saying the sky is blue.

It was pretty hard to get things done when you just _gave up_. When someone chops off your arms and legs, it's hard to keep moving forward, of course.

So, in that unfortunate scenario, you just sit there and wait for death to catch up. Say you're stuck in the body of a pathetic, decrepit, arrogant old man; if you're unlucky enough to be in that scenario, it won't take long.

Speaking from experience, of course.

Death, I like to think, had been waiting for Octavius for a _long_ time. Considering how many close calls I had up to that point, the same could have been said for me, but… But it didn't show any vehemence when it took me. I think it, she - she, because the personification of Death as a woman, with breasts, will always and forever be one of the more odd things I have seen – knew that I was me, and not Otto.

Though in my final moments, I saw nothing. I didn't _see_ Death coming, but I felt her when I finally closed my eyes. It was cold and tired, like sleeping. Arms wrapping around me, a brisk feeling and then… nothing.

And I thought: It had been a good run. You went down swinging, Parker, like you always wanted. What more can you ask for? Now's not the time to be _ungrateful_ , right?

So, you're trapped in the body of a man who didn't feel as if he deserved his fate, and a lucky enough guy to be on the receiving end of someone who had cheated Death. Fantastic. Shows over, Parker. Time to pack it up, go home.

…Would I be going home? Or not? If I wasn't, then let me tell you that was the sign of a wasted life, or a cheated one.

In the end, I had tried to fight back like I always did – _little puny Parker, so outmatched, always the underdog. No one ever expected him to win._ But I did. Every. Damn. Time. I was Spider-Man. More than that, I was Peter Parker, the beloved son of not only Richard and Mary, but Ben and May Parker. I held on, I did what Otto himself couldn't do and I used that pathetic, expiring body to the last to try to get my life back.

It wasn't that I wasn't 'good' enough, it was that _Otto_ wasn't, and he had never been. That explains why he wanted my body, my life.

But…God, I was tired _._

Octavius's body had been a step away from a corpse. It was only rage, indignation, and tried and true stubbornness, that old friend of mine, to keep me going. I had fought him enough times to have some idea how to work his metal tentacles, but the old body wasn't a match for mine. Otto wanted to _live_ as much as I did, but there was one succinct difference between us: Otto pulled no punches.

If I'm honest with myself, if I really let loose, I can do some damage. The kind that takes only a tap on the head to put someone to sleep. Or crush their skull. Ten tons is no joke, but I know I can lift far more than that. I have in the past. So, when you put a beaten, brittle old man in front of a Spider-Man who is willing to kill in order to live, don't root for the underdog. Save more money on the tickets, and stay home.

Otto Octavius had died that day, unmourned. His deeds were still fresh in the minds of the world whom he had deceived, and no one raised an eyebrow at Spider-Man, who had never killed anyone in cold blood. That they knew of.

He had damned Peter Parker to an ignominious death. Unnoticed, uncared for, and pretty painful too, because he had an axe to grind.

It was alright, though. Because I had _tried_. Yay. Boy, what a consolation prize that was. It wasn't that I wasn't good enough, it was that Otto wasn't, and that brought a proud, amused smile to his dying face.

Otto Octavius wasn't man enough to face death. Otto Octavius wasn't man enough to defeat Spider-Man again. The last time he had, Spider-Man was a _teenager_. The last time he tried, he had to have _help._ He had to brainwash the _Avengers_ to get that job done, and he still _failed._

So for what it was worth, I died satisfied. Satisfied that Otto, for all of his ego, had lowered himself to stealing my body and my life to be the better man. Octavius hadn't been man enough to accept that he didn't deserve a second chance. Peter Parker did deserve one, and like a greedy, fat, rotund child stealing someone else's lunch, he snatched that up for himself.

In hindsight, he did me a favor. I'd thank him, but I'd just as soon punt him.

I have two brothers, Ben Reilly Parker, and Kaine Parker. I stopped worrying about the latter's assuming of fratricide's poster boy's identity because he got better. Up to that point, we were on the best terms we had been in… ever.

Ben, of course, was the best of us. All the good, none of the bad. Kaine was the middle child, I suppose, complete with all the problems; like looking up to the eldest, and being protective of the youngest. He had been beat with the ugly stick like you wouldn't believe and shared my luck, only worse, since he went dark side for a time and karma is a fair bitch, but still a bitch.

And me? I was the 'eldest', complete with that _stubborn_ sense of responsibility.

Kaine had had an interesting view of the world. They were both my clones, down to all of their memories, so he got that from me. Ben and Kaine were the little sober and surly angels on my shoulders, and I could perfectly understand the latter. Ben was the youngest brother. You just wanted to see him be happy _._ You want both to be happy, of course, but when you're miserable, it helps to have company.

Otto did me a favor. As tired as I was, the last thing I saw before I died was _family_. There was Ben Reilly, holding his hand out.

And wouldn't you know that I took that hand without hesitation?

* * *

The first thing I remember _after_ dying is Ben clapping me on my shoulder. Not my Uncle Ben, but my brother, Ben. …Who is actually me, my clone. With… blonde hair. It's confusing, but you get used to it.

Even more confusing is that, in death, we didn't share the same… soul, but that was a relief. I hated the thought that, since he was created from me, he'd be either my son or an empty shell. He didn't deserve either. He was just as much me as I was, and better.

Though I was disappointed to see that he still had his had blonde hair. I do not look good with blonde hair.

The first emotion I remember registering was peace. Have you ever walked down a quiet street in the beginning of summer, thousands of leaves rustling loudly, and the air is a temperature just slightly cooler than you, but so fresh? It's quiet enough that you can hear someone's watering their lawn and you can smell the slightest drizzle. The clouds are white and puffy, and the sky is the _best_ type of blue.

It was like that, and it felt good. Then I felt relief, because, hey, my brother was here. _I_ was here.

But where was I? Where were we? Three guesses, first two don't count.

Considering I wasn't being ramshackled by a pineapple topped pitchfork, I was pretty safe in my assumption. But unlike Ben, I was more cynical and held my tongue. Years of increasingly halfhearted optimism taught me to not even try at it, much less speak about it.

Then, like he was picking up on my thoughts, Ben grinned at me. "You're home, Pete."

Our eyes went to the house a few paces in front and to the left. The house I'd only seen in pictures, one I could barely remember from my childhood. My parent's house. My _home._ The last thing I recalled about it was leaving it before being dropped off at Ben and May's, and I had never come back.

"You're home."

I wasn't tired anymore and thankfully, I hadn't passed on in Otto's body. That old chestnut, 'As in life, so in death', _really_ had me worried. I was me, Peter Parker, for all that was worth.

I was apparently worth _enough_ , considering where I was.

Ben was there, so it must have been heaven. If anyone deserved that, it was Ben Reilly, all of my good with none of the bad. The man who took life's ugly stick over the head and kept going.

No, that's what I did; _I_ kept trucking, kept trudging, kept working, through grimace and rarer grins. No matter how many bad things were said about him, Peter Parker wouldn't quit. Spider-Man, would never give up. _You're Spider-Man. Act like it._ Not when he was backed into a corner, not when his defeat was damn near assured.

Ben was a whole other monster. Ben kept _smiling,_ he kept thinking _positive,_ and he was better for it. Over the years where I had become jaded and obsessive, with proclamations of _No One Dies_ and so forth, Ben would have lived life by the day, keep his eyes on his goals, and grin as he ran toward them.

I used to be like him, I think. Kaine too. He gets it from me, after all. But somewhere along the way… we got so tired of it that we started hitting back, Kaine especially. He turned to outward aggression and used his fists, while I turned inward, took every hit with a joke while pretending that it was all okay. _That's life, Parker, and you earned it_ , and that was how I went from Spider-Man: Lone Vigilante, to Spider-Man: please shut up.

Ben would accept it and move on. Trade punches and slip out of the way, leaving life feeling like it was an idiot. Ben Reilly... God, it was good to see him again.

"Mom and Dad are going to want to see you, since you'll be, you know, 'staying'," he said conspiratorially. I suppose it was to ease the transition of passing over, and I didn't see any angels float down to do that. Still, it annoyed me a little, which in hindsight was a good thing. The last thing I wanted to do was break down on his shoulder and start crying.

When I saw my parents though, I just about did.

I could barely remember them. Sure, I had seen photos, ingrained their features into my memory. _The family you'll never see again_. But I didn't _remember_ them. Not how I remembered Uncle Ben.

Uncle Ben, who'd take me to the park and play baseball. Uncle Ben who'd ruffle my head when I tinkered with the electronics, who'd call me a genius with absolute pride when I helped with the wiring around the house. Uncle Ben, who always picked me up when I was down, beaten, or just plain sad.

Who said, "The game ain't over yet, kiddo. Get up and start playing like it means something."

I missed my Uncle Ben. I missed my _parents_. I missed my brother, the _good_ in life I used to have. I missed it all.

And I think they knew it was coming. The door opened and… there they were. Ben is the exact image of me, but with the odd habit of dyeing his hair. My father, our father, is almost the same, but with that mid twentieth century, handsome agent look, like 007. In the pictures I had seen, he always looked so calm, so confident, with neat, slicked back hair. I had only seen the expression he now wore once. When he was holding me as a child. His smile was uneven, like he was struggling to keep it. His eyes glistened.

God, I broke down and started bawling _._ I'm Spider-Man, I _earned_ that right.

I couldn't remember my parents and here they were. Thanks God, life sucks and then you die. Then you remember the raspberry scent of you mother's hair, your dad's aftershave that made you scrunch your nose up so tight when you were a kid, when he'd pick you up and twirl you around the room like a sack of flour. The sound of their laughs and the feeling of their hugs and then…

…If you want to beat Spider-Man, you'll have a hard time. I've been in just about every scrap there is to have. Zombies, vampires, assassins, friends, gods, aliens, fish people, clones, other mes, female counter parts, myself, water, _sand_. Robots, nanites, reptiles, the entire city of New York, entire teams of super heroes and villains.

I'm not the best, the strongest, the most skilled, but I lasted as long as I did for a reason, and I'm pretty damn good all things considered. I've been at this since I was fifteen and I've learned some things. Impressive for a kid who was on his own for nearly every step of the way.

But, if you want to beat Spider-Man, make it easy for yourself. Bring my parents back to life and you'll get to see me break. Down. But, you only get the one chance to see a grown man who beat a Herald of Galactus cry like a little _baby,_ and that's not an everyday experience! Enjoy it, because then it's back to a regularly scheduled web-slinging ass-kicking.

But hey, you get to tell your friends you not only made Spider-Man cry, but that he beat you up too, and _thanked_ you for the experience! Congrats!

My mom rocked me back and forth and my dad tussled my hair like I was a kid, and I felt like one too. I remembered the last time I saw him and he had done just the same. "We'll be back, I promise," he said, but they hadn't, and I became little orphan Parker, the burden on his aunt and Uncle.

No, that wasn't true, Ben and May loved me like their own son. I was their son. I _am._ And when I saw Ben again, I started crying, again.

I'm Spider-Man. Mind shatteringly weird things are a regular Thursday for me. Over a decade of being me opens _doors_ for you, and it was because of that that I had seen Ben numerous times. Alive, dead, alternate universe versions of him, you name it. Where it mattered though, my Ben was always a ghost. My Ben Parker died, and his death was the only reason Spider-Man existed. Ever.

The places I've been to, where he lived? Don't turn out well. Not for me. In the best of situations I turn into a full-of-himself jackass because it takes death to temper Peter Parker and make him into Spider-Man. What a _lucky_ guy.

No matter what, even in the universe where Ben was a psychopathic evil schmuck that wanted his Peter Parker to absorb my life force to add to his gestalt strength, he was there to tell me how proud he was of me, that I didn't need to blame myself for his death anymore. That I never did.

I must have introduced stubbornness into the family, because that never caught on. But the hugs were always nice; they were enough to make me think, if only for a day or two, "You've done good, Parker." They made me feel eight years old again. No Spider-Man, no death other than my parents. Just me and my Uncle… my father. Still alive.

And then he'd be gone. Wisped away back to Heaven, I was absolutely sure. I'd hear a whisper. _"I love you kiddo, and I am so proud of you."_

I'd collect myself, because hey, "The game's not over yet, Parker. Get out there and play like it means something!"

I was Spider-Man, and it was time to act like it. Peter Parker and his woes could take the backseat for now. That's life, Parker!

And in death – in the after-life, actually – Benjamin Parker hadn't changed.

If you took him out of my thirteenth birthday's memory, he'd be exactly the same. That's how well I remembered him. The same smile, the same hair, the same brown sweater with the dress shirt underneath. The same voice.

"Good to see you, kiddo."

Even without spider strength, I could have _torn_ through that house like tissue paper just to get to him. Nothing could stop me, not even the Hulk, but that's because he's a good guy. Big softie. He understands.

I damn near did, too, but I felt so _weak._ My arms felt so slow and sluggish and _small_.

"Uncle Ben," I wept. This couldn't be a dream. It just couldn't. Not again. I had done too much, earned too much, I _deserved_ this. Just… Please, God, don't let it be a dream, don't let it be a nightmare, please. " _Uncle Ben_."

His words were like the best song I had ever heard. "So proud of you…" was all I could hear. I was a kid again, down to the small, spindly stature and wide glasses and oversized teeth and buttoned up dress shirt.

It took feeling droplets hitting my head to realize he was sobbing too. "So damn proud of you kid…"

* * *

In my life, I resigned myself to a few things. My relationships, after the first couple of truly meaningful ones, would not work out. Not when they tended to die because of me. Even as a kid, I admit I blamed myself for my parent's death. As a teenager I blamed myself for Ben's death, though everyone would tell me I was wrong for doing so.

In his own eyes Peter Parker is the nearsighted little punk who got the closest thing he had to a father killed, and that put a shade over how he viewed himself. Couple that with the fact that every single world he'd been to out there only had Peter Parker as Spider-Man because Ben Parker was _dead_ because of him and that shade became a curtain.

Later on, his first girlfriend's brother? Dead.

The only officer to have faith in that 'menacing murderer' Spider-Man? Dead.

The man's daughter that _hates_ that mean ol' Spider who happens to be Parker's girlfriend? _Also_ dead.

Fast forward. Turns out, the girl who he blames himself for her death turned out to cheat on him with his worst enemy, got pregnant with children… That she wanted him to raise. Said children try to _kill_ him.

Further along. Crime fighting Detective of a partner? _She's_ dead. He could not save her. Then, he finds out she was in love with him, he was her _hero._

The man who he'd come to know as a brother, who he trusted with not only his life, but everyone's life? _Dead._

The girl who he inspired to become a hero? To become _Spider-Woman_? Dead.

The friend who works to keep extremely dangerous criminals behind bars? _Dead,_ because he didn't kill the unsympathetic, monstrous shell of a man who killed to feel something, anything.

His only living sibling who had a litany of bad deeds behind him, who sacrificed his life so that this guy could live? Dead. But he got better, and then worse, because being a giant tarantula man sucks ass.

Dead, dead, _dead._

But hey, Peter Parker is no quitter! Never let that be said!

I'm not a quitter. It really didn't ever stop me from trying to build new relationships… although, my efforts were a series of diminishing returns. Eventually I just… stopped myself from caring too much, unlike Ben who kept on his path down to his last breath. And even then, after a point that had been flipped on its head and I started caring too _much_.

Honestly, _no one dies_? What was I thinking? That was neurotic, naïve, and just plain childish, even for me, and it got a good woman killed, I'd later find out. It got children shot. _I_ did.

But not quitting means you work. You work to earn, and in death, Peter Parker had earned every _scrap_ of good he deserved in life, and he got it in spades.

The house was wonderful. Outside and in. It wasn't a mansion, ever endless, it was a _home._ Filled with family and friends I'd never thought I'd see again because I didn't think I _deserved_ to. Every single bad feeling and doubt I ever had was gone. Every regret melted away. I deserved that, didn't I?

I hadn't even hesitated. Kaine gets his attitude from me, after all.

 _Yes the hell I did._

* * *

Time passes differently when you're dead. At least when you're 'upstairs'. You don't need to sleep or eat, but you can if you wish. The choice is yours, but the good times never stop. Emotions, experiences, they never lose their luster. Fresh and new as they always were. You never get tired of your loved ones in the slightest. The same joke over again will make you laugh just as hard.

After breaking down as a child on my parent's doorstep, it was time for the good times to roll and I swear I heard a fat woman sing. Shows over, Parker! The game's done! Good, no, _Amazing_ hustle! Hit the showers and then it's time for the after-party!

And what an after-party it was.

It could have gone on for a thousand days and a thousand nights as far as I was concerned. In every room of the house something different was happening. One room my parents were dancing that old timey romance dance, another Ben was breakdancing on the ceiling and Uncle Ben and my own grandfather, William Fitzpatrick, were in an arm-wrestling match (that I _still_ think Ben let him win). George Stacey was teaching Mattie Franklin how to play cards with Ned Leeds, and little ol' me?

I was lucky enough to be cornered by Silver Sablinova and Jean DeWolfe.

Both were slightly cross with me, in the best way, for keeping a secret like I had. Silver was annoyed at herself for not finding out, and Jean? _Detective_ Jean DeWolfe, who had gone to her grave for never connecting the dots… to say she was 'annoyed' was an understatement.

They kissed me once, twice, three, six, ten times, and even dead I thought I died and went to heaven. I couldn't breathe. I didn't want to. I kissed right back. You had this coming for a while, Parker. Soak it up.

I saw Gwen too, and while any feeling of guilt of her death was long gone, any negative emotion fading away like washed away paint with every passing moment, I now remembered what she had done in life with clear eyes. She had betrayed me in the worst way, and even in death there wasn't any forgiveness, not from me. Acceptance, yes, because resentment would not change what she had done. But neither would forgiveness, and the choice was mine.

We talked, and she looked as young as ever, as beautiful as ever, but the spark just wasn't there, and left me feeling a bit lukewarm. Looking at a woman and seeing Norman Osborn will do that to you. I had no idea how similar he looked to Tommy Lee Jones.

She had left not soon after, and I found myself pinned between two delightful beauties again, barely noticing, and barely caring.

Eventually, the party stops. Time, dilated as it was, still apparently passed as night turned into day, turned into night. The house emptied of everyone that wasn't family, and I bid goodbye to Captain Stacey and Ned Leeds and Mattie Franklin, who had their own places to go, though it took a while to say goodbye to Silver and Jean. A long while.

Normally I'd be concerned with having a threesome in my parents' house. But I was dead. Hell, I was Spider-Man. _Was_ being the operative word in both cases. I was _now_ in a threesome, and it felt _good_. Jean and Silver left limping.

Felicia was right. I was good. If they were to be believed, I was _amazing_ , but it was hard to understand them since, you know, they could barely speak.

My grandpa Will certainly seemed proud. My mother, fortunately, was absent. Fortunate because that would have ruined the afterglow. No man wants to bask in the afterglow of the best threesome of his after-life with his mom in the same room, no matter how proud she might be.

And as it turns out, my mother took after her father. In a lot of ways, I in turn, took after her. The jokes, the gab, the muted perversity. My intellect was all dad, though, right down to the ingenuity.

Afterward came the long talk about the life I led. Mom was absent still, but I wasn't worried. It wasn't like she could die, and I had not one iota of worry left in me, the world was just that good.

I can sum the conversation up in nine sentences. It went on for about four hours, complete with my grandfather beating me over the head with a pillow and everyone else joining him.

"You take on too much responsibility, son." Dad. "You're too hard on yourself."

"My death was not your fault." Uncle Ben. "It has _never_ been."

"You kicked _so much ass_!" Grandpa Will. "…Why didn't you get with those two dames _sooner_?"

"You need to learn to build yourself up more. And why did you always default back to the basic spider-suit?" Ben, and then he chased me outside with the couch. "What's _wrong_ with you?!"

After the chase and we calmed down, grandpa looked at me, suddenly somber. Just looking at him I could tell he was the type of man to take life by the horns and steer it where he wanted it to go, a real partier. But the look on his face now actually made him look like a grandfather, right down to that solemn crease of a smile on his face. "Let's go see your little girls, Pete."

I blinked.

There's a couple of parts of my life I didn't like to remember, but in death, in the after-life, comes a feeling certainty and recall that you cannot ignore. You take stock of your deeds and accept them. My grandfather's words hit me upside the head like Thor himself, and I was faced with the cold truth.

Peter Parker had been a father, once.

When he was young, just over twenty-two, he and his beautiful fiancé Mary Jane Watson, had gotten pregnant. She gave birth to a beautiful little girl… that he never got to see, thanks to Spider-Man. Little Mayday Parker was a stillborn, and Peter Parker kept playing the game like it was his job. And God did he need a way to vent at that time.

Then his brother died.

Things between him and his fiancée fell apart quickly after that. Later, he entertained the thought of being a father again. Mary Jane was long gone, but on good terms, which would change later, and he'd never find out why. He found a little homeless girl in a frozen alleyway, sleeping in a box plastered with Spider-Man photos. She had the sweetest, most innocent voice and he thought, he _knew,_ that he could be a father if it meant saving her. He'd stop being Spider-Man if that's what it took.

She died in a hospital bed not two feet away from him. Her name was Leah.

So please, believe me when I say this: When I heard those tiny voices behind me, my blood froze over.

They appeared as if they'd been signaled. My mother came into the house, shushing, and looked up, the widest, most beautiful smile I had ever seen on her face. The door shut quietly behind her, the shuffling of tiny little feet coming to a stop.

Negative emotions don't exist upstairs, but things like surprise? Reactions like gaping like a fish on the border of crying again? Those are coping mechanisms. _Completely_ allowed.

Release the valves and flush your emotions, Parker! You've seen what happens when you keep it all in, let it all out!

One little girl with chocolate hair and deep hazel eyes and the cutest little button nose was holding a picture of me in one hand. Of _Spider-Man_. In the other she guided along the most curious looking toddler I'd ever laid eyes on, with emerald eyes just like her mother and chestnut hair like her father. She wore a small set of overalls with a spider plastered on it, and when she bumped into the other child's leg, unseeing, she wobbled, and her eyes immediately centered on me.

Their voices were unified. Curiosity, shock, joy. All things I never thought I'd get to hear with _that word,_ with that pitch of innocence. "Daddy?"

Even if I wasn't dead I would not have fainted. My legs gave way and I hit the ground in a heap. I was bullrushed so fast all I saw were two masses of brunette hair. The party… that would come later. Peter Parker needed some time with his family. As a son, and as a father.

* * *

While little May's singular tuft of hair was the same shade as mine, she had her mother's eyes. Leah, meanwhile, had a large bushel of frizzy, chocolate hair, and deep, wide chocolate eyes. I decided it was better to brush it sooner rather than later, and with her in my lap, my rocking leg was doing a good job of putting her to sleep.

While I rocked my leg, Mayday climbed on my back like a little monkey, intent on inspecting every bit of my face like I was a science experiment. She poked and prodded, even pinched me, though none of it hurt. By the time Mayday had tired of that, Leah had fallen asleep in my lap, her photo of me falling limply out of her hand and to the floor with a soft thump. She held on to me so tight, like I were a dream about to be whisked away.

Though it felt like I was losing circulation, I didn't care in the slightest. Mayday possessed the same amount of care and just about strangled me as she peppered me with kisses. She's her daddy's little girl, alright. Right down to that spider-strength.

I was unconcerned with the specifics of how, or why. I was dead, living the after-life, which as far as I concerned kicked the _crap_ out of regular life. Leah was family, because she had died as family. I prayed to God, roared that she'd be my daughter if it was the last thing I had done. She'd be family and I'd retire, I'd sell the formula for the web fluid or work for Tony Stark or _something_ , just let her be okay.

I _pleaded_. I would be the best father _ever._ What kid wouldn't want Spider-Man as their Dad, right?

She flatlined.

Keep playing, Parker – the game, at that point, turned into a beat-em-up. I wrecked that particular floor of the hospital. Crushed some poor lady's car, even. Caked Jameson's office with eggs and less desirable things, but none of it helped. But I just kept playing, because that was all I could do. I didn't quit.

But enough of that. It's the after-party, Parker! Time to play!

Daddy's home girls, and he's not going anywhere.

* * *

I think that some elements of… heaven, I'll call it that because that's what it was, for me, don't get introduced until you get there.

My parents, my entire family, everyone, knew about little May and had watched me cradle Leah's body. But they hadn't actually seen them in person, such as they were, until then. If my arrival had elicited a party, Mayday and Leah's appearance had brought… not a lull, but a time of contentment.

And being 'after-alive', that time was really, really long. I wasn't complaining. Never having to worry about them being in danger or leaving them for Spider-Man was a fantastic sedative. I rarely slept in that time, not that I needed to, but when I did it was surrounded by family. In life, it wasn't something I ever got to do.

Leah didn't leave my side, but Mayday was just as curious and adventurous as I was when I was a child. She had gained the habit of crawling on everything and everyone, and Ben took a lot of fun in chasing after her on the ceiling.

Leah had been accepted unanimously into the Parker family, not that there was ever any question. She had a _flipbook_ of Spider-Man, me and Ben both, and would beg us to tell her stories about our careers. All things considered, I had warmed up to the idea. Then again, there was _no_ saying no to that face, and her wide sparkling eyes. So, as I brushed her hair to get all of the frizz out, it seemed to be a perpetual process, I picked an event that occurred not too long after getting my powers.

"So, when I first started out-" I started.

"When _we_ first started out," Ben coughed as he leaned over Uncle Ben's chair, "I did it too," he huffed.

" _This_ is why I never asked for a brother, you know. I don't like to share." Ben pouted and little Mayday, who'd been skulking around the wall, bat him on the head and smiled hopefully at me. "Atta girl," I grinned. She beamed.

"As I was saying…When _we_ first started out," I began, glaring at Ben, "I wasn't too bright."

He was right back at it again. "Too bright is right. All the mistakes I made, whew, it's embarrassing to-" he stopped, looked at me, and began to whistle. Badly. "Carry on."

"Before we're interrupted by your Uncle Ben again," I gave Leah a tight hug and a knowing, proud look to my own Uncle Ben, "I was stupid. And there was this fight with the Vulture. Ben?"

He didn't miss a beat. "So it went like this. Here's this old, decrepit, senile bald chrome dome with wings. I'm _Spider-Man_ , I got this. I can handle it, I lift a truck for breakfast, no problem! I think I have him on the ropes and it looks like he's trying to run away-"

"-But what he was actually doing was baiting me. Dropped low to street level and we thought he had hit the ground. Somehow it was forgotten that he had wings _."_ Ben and I glared at each other as if it was the other's fault, because it technically was. The fault of your weirdly blonde, blue eyed, but with the same brown eyebrows, reflection.

I _don't_ look good with blonde hair.

"He was playing possum," Ben groaned, "And I fell right for it. I followed him down to a nearby roof and wondered, "Gosh, why is my spider-sense was ringing?""

"Back then I thought it was a faulty mechanism at best," I continued.

"Or I was going insane and would start to hear voices next."

"But there it was, going _kind of_ loud, because an old man, wings or no, couldn't be much of a threat."

"Or so we thought."

Leah looked between us with rapt attention, the widest smile on her face, getting a little dizzy from whipping her head back and forth and her hair pelting me in the face. "What happened next?"

Uncle Ben snorted, and little Mayday had found a perch on her grandmother's head, waving and gesticulating wildly. My mother covered her mouth. "I'm afraid to hear the next part. I _hate_ horror stories, you know."

"Mom, the only thing horrifying about it is how stupid I was," Ben rolled his eyes, slumping against our Uncle.

"Anyway, I think that the Vulture has flown the coop, and am feeling _pretty_ good about myself. Big bad hero, that's _me._ Next thing I know I see a beak nose and a near toothless grin and the Vulture uppercuts me to the next story."

"There I was, big bad hero, getting socked in the face by a _fantastic geriatric_."

Leah gasped. "No way!" She shouted, thinking "No way could any villain get the best of Spider-Man! There's just no way!"

Except there was, and being here was proof of that. The thought didn't bring any lingering resentment or anger because there wasn't any. Otto had done me a favor, and I was happy for it. After all, I was here, and he was living the hectic life of Spider-Man and Peter Parker both, may he choke on them.

"Unfortunately yes, Leah," Ben said, looking smug, "Your daddy was just that stupid."

"He is not!" Leah argued, puffing her cheeks, absolutely fierce at the prospect of someone insulting me.

Ben shared a look with me and then looked directly in the mirror. "Is too! Just look at that dopey grin and that stupid blonde hair. Why, in his younger days, Peter Parker was a buffo- waitaminute…."

Leah, as if she had gained the upper hand in an epic argument that stretched the borders of the house itself, puffed up her chest and looked down her nose at him. It would have been impressive if he wasn't about three times her size.

Ben started to whistle innocently, looking at anything but his niece, including our parents and Uncle for help. His eyes landed on little May, who made a noise and a cute little face at him. Accurately translated, it meant, 'You're on your own.'

I shrugged. "I think they've got you beat, Ben."

"It's a conspiracy, the lot of it!" Ben pouted.

"With stupid blonde hair like that I can't blame us," Leah snickered. That's my girl.

Looking horrified at the thought, Ben went over to Mayday and picked her up, ignoring her slight wriggles as she recognized him and immediately went for his face. Like with me, she had built the habit of jabbing anything that looked like daddy with her pudgy little fingers. This included her Uncle Ben and grandpa, too.

Ben, with his blue contacts and blonde hair, looked smug at us, even as she groped at his eyes. "She- _poke_ -has- _poke_ -my hair!" He proclaimed, pointing at me, and glared at his niece and started poking baby May's face back. "Let's see how _you_ like it, you little baby-ball."

I stared pointedly at his blonde head, was reminded of Johnny, and made a point to go back to brushing Leah's hair in silence.

"She's a bit too young to dye her hair, sweetie," our mother said. She was sitting on top of our father, in the loveseat. It was an accurate name, too. I almost gagged and Leah, just like her dad, did too.

"She- she could-"Ben sniffed pitifully, "she could learn."

I snickered. "Learning to do stupid things is not something I want my baby to do, Ben."

Ben jostled me, bringing May to my face. I tried to remain stoic as her tiny little fingers wriggled over my face and nipped at them with my lips. Alas, she was too strong. Sensing weakness, she fled to my head and became utterly distracted by trying to figure out where her fingers went as they disappeared in my hair.

"Like Father like brother like daughter, Peter," Ben said sagely. "Uncle Ben, you agree with me, right?"

Uncle Ben was quiet for a long moment, but then looked sadly at Ben. Then, he reached to the side of his chair and pulled out… some brunette hair dye. I had no idea where he got it from, but God bless that man. "This needs to stop, kiddo. It's been going on for too long."

"But-"

"Join us, son," my father and fellow brunette chimed. "It's fun! We have chocolate milk."

"And chocolate cake," my mother opined.

"And matching eyebrows," I said, holding Leah up next to me, and she grinned widely with tiny little teeth. Mayday, as smart as she was, peeked up over my head and gave an adorable smile, patting my head like a bongo drum.

"…" Ben stared his slow trudge upstairs and into the bathroom. When he next exited, Blonde-Man was no more. Now it really _was_ heaven.

* * *

Between the three of us, myself my father, and Ben, Mayday could scarcely tell the difference. Between my father and I, the difference was the largest, but not by much. He was older, of course, with crow's feet at his eyes and a slight streak of grey, and a perpetually calm smile. Whenever she saw him she'd bat his nose with distinct gibberish that we all came to recognize as either "Grandpa" or "Not Daddy".

Between Ben and myself, my hair was slightly shorter, giving me an older look, and Ben's smile was wider. Our careers as Spider-Man had affected us, and my smile was usually closer to my father's. For the first time in the longest time though my smile was exactly like Ben's, and my eyes felt bright. Watching my daughters play had that effect on me, and not having to worry about Spider-Man was a relief, the biggest weight off my shoulders.

But then, as it usually does, life came a knockin'.

There's a trope out there: "The Call knows where you live." You can't ignore the phone, because it will knock. You can't ignore the door because it will mail, email, and then break your door down and stare you in the face and push your ass out of your house. Personally, I like to call it the Parker luck, but the combined efforts of my gestalt family, assuming one voice of "Lighten up!" has gotten me out of it.

But I can't help myself. I'm usually right when it comes to these feelings. Mostly usually. Sometimes.

Cynicism is a living thing, and as I later found out, I wasn't dead. My history had colored my views and made me more cynical than Ben, I admit, but there's reason for that. It's the Parker luck, Chuck.

The last thing I remember before breathing again, is seeing my family. Then I was alone, and I heard a scream pierce the black, empty void. I won't lie - damn, did it feel good to hear it.

* * *

I woke up that morning in the same spot on the couch. Mayday was curled up on my chest, clinging to me like a magnet and Leah was no better, holding on to my side and not letting go.

If anyone tells you that the weather is always the same in heaven, always bright and sunny and a white picket fence type thing, slap them in face because they have no idea. A light drizzle had accompanied the dark clouds that day, making everything nice and lazy and relaxed. The perfect day to stay in. Ben was upstairs snoring as loud as a kitten, and I in the same way didn't feel like waking up.

No Spider-Man, no responsibilities. It's Break Time Parker. Enjoy it.

And I was. I looked out the window and at the dark clouds and smiled, and closed my eyes. I hugged my children closer.

My eyes should have stayed shut, just few a few more minutes. I opened them again and that's when I saw him. Doctor Strange.

His face appeared in the ether first, then the rest of his body, as if he were stepping through a wall of water and mist. He hadn't seen me and to be honest, my first instinct was to hide. I knew what was coming, my instincts of an encroaching pain in the ass were heightened far more than my optimistic brother.

But I _am_ Spider-Man, unfortunately, and I can now understand Kaine's distaste for the title. But for my daughters, my family? I'll take on the Hulk if I have to. I've done it in the past, one more off the bucket list. I got this.

That made nothing easier.

Then, as it usually did, life came knocking at my door. More accurately, the _living_ came knocking at it.

Stephen Strange was a tall man. Taller than me, but around the height of Kaine, who I hoped I wouldn't see for a while. Maybe, just maybe he was here to deliver a message? I already had one in mind especially if Kaine had gotten himself into some mystical shenanigan in my stead, and it wasn't just, "Listen to the Doctor."

I wanted my other sibling to live a good life and be as happy as I was in death. If this was just a housecall, if everything was okay with him, then I'd tell, _beg_ Strange to relay a message to him from all of us. He's on the right path, I _knew_ he was, I could _feel_ it. He was doing the right thing. You're a hero, Kaine. We love you, Kaine, we are so proud of you Kaine. _Kaine Parker_ , that's our _brother_ , that's our _son_ , our uncle, our grandson, our _friend,_ and he'll always have a place with us.

After prying myself from my kids, I got up and opened the door. The look on Strange's face was about what I didn't want to expect, for several reasons.

It was one of disbelief and sudden, resigned acceptance. Shame and guilt, and I was tiringly familiar with them all. I inched away from him because those emotions are sickeningly infectious and, after so long without them, they weren't something I missed.

It was with a bemused smile that I greeted him, realizing that no one had figured out Peter Parker, Spider-Man, the _real_ one and only, was dead. Until now, of course. I laughed, but nothing was funny about this. "Take a wrong turn at Albuquerque, Doc? Friendly as it is, I think you're in the wrong neighborhood."

His smile was grim and quickly over taken by a solemn frown. I stepped aside and bid him to come in, and he looked around the house with a shocked and pained look. When he looked at me, that's when I knew. Hello, Parker Luck. Goodbye, good times.

His voice was dry, almost breathless. "My friend, I am so sorry." Here we go.

I waved my hand dismissively, stepping outside and as he followed me, and shut the door behind me. The rain was picking up and I looked at the darkening clouds, trying to keep myself from getting angry. That's when I knew something was wrong. Negative emotions just _didn't_ exist here. They just didn't. So _why_ was I fighting them back?

"Don't be, Doc. Not your fault I'm here," I said quietly. "If you want to do me a favor though? Just leave."

"Peter," He said, looking down. "I can't do that."

" _Of course you can_." I snapped. "You are the Sorcerer _Supreme._ Leaving a little spider in the web he's built for himself isn't even a _challenge_ for you."

He flinched at that, and I realized the double meaning of my words. Doctor Strange hadn't been anywhere near me when I died. No one noticed or cared, and what had it been, months? _Years_? All that time of being left alone from ' _responsibility'_ , and _now_ he comes back.

Great.

"Doc… I'm happy. Just, please, if this isn't a house call? Go to someone who needs it, visit Kaine, my brother. About yay-high, looks like me, but really grumpy. My time has come and gone, finally, and I accept that."

"That's why I am here," the regal, salt-and-pepper haired sorcerer said, hardening his voice with determination. He looked tired and bedraggled, which brought me some comfort in a sadistic way. I didn't want him to take pleasure in ripping me from Heaven, after all. "Your time has not come. It should not for a long time."

"Oh, I am not going to like the sound of this, am I? I swear, if you're telling me I'm supposed to be immortal or something-"

"Please, may we talk?"

I wanted to say "No, get away from my home," and toss him through the window, but… the good Doctor and I have been through some things. Out of so many, I trust him. He's more of a understanding conversationalist than Reed Richards, more of a mentor than Tony Stark, more relatable than Steve Rogers, definitely more mature than Johnny Storm, and less worryingly temperamental than Logan while having the same amount of insight.

After all, it was thanks to the Doc him that I got to watch myself _die_. Cross _that_ off the bucket list and talk about insight.

Wait.

"I've seen myself die _already_ , Doc. I get shot down in a graveyard, framed for murder when I'm an old man," I said, narrowing my eyes. "If that's the life you want me to go back to-"

"That was a future corrupted by Dormammu's interference with the Web," Strange patiently corrected. "Like a mended cloth, it will not come to pass."

I was so close to making a Gandalf joke, but the Doc didn't have the look for it. Instead I surrendered myself to rolling my eyes. Crap. " _The Web_. …You have got to be kidding me."

"Miss Carpenter, the latest Madame Web, told me of your…"

"Death, Doc. It's okay to say it. Not like I'll _drop dead_ or anything." I rolled my eyes. "A bit _too late_ for that."

"Not death, Peter. You were _cheated_ , stolen from your own body. Death and passing over requires the death of your earthly body, which is still very much alive. You were _possessed."_

His words were grave, and I get the feeling he expected me to gasp or something. The tired groan that grumbled up from my throat made him blink. "Just another Tuesday," I mumbled to myself. "I bet Captain America doesn't have to deal with this. Does He? I don't think he does."

He chuckled a bit. "No, he does not."

"Called it." I grimaced. " _Then why am I here_?"

In a moment of startling humor, the Doc tried to smile. It was a guilty one, but I appreciated it. Both the guilt, and the act. It made me feel the tiniest bit better. "You've earned a lengthy vacation," he said with certainty, and I could attest to that.

"…But vacations end. Especially the best ones," I finished. He nodded solemnly. "You know, between you and me Doc, Julia is pretty _shitty_ at her job." Strange's eyes rose at my language, but I ignored him. I was on a roll and could hold back what I said if I wanted to, and I didn't. I could see why Kaine did it so much. It was relieving, emphatic, and helped soothe the growing vein on my forehead.

There's just something about "Gee and gosh, Doctor, Miss Carpenter isn't very swell at her job," made me want to hurl a piece of the sidewalk into orbit.

"How long did it take her to realize I was dead?" I was willing to bet on five years. Shoot for the stars, kid. What would Otto get up to in that time?

"She was in a coma, so quite some time," he replied dryly, obviously getting used to the full Parker after-life experience. Hold on tight Doc, because it's going to get acerbic.

"So much for that clairvoyance of hers. _Useless_. I died once. _Twice_. Three times, in fact. The one time I save a little girl's soul from Death and Thanos themselves. The other time I came back and _ate_ the thing that killed me, and before that my gigantic fucking spider corpse gave birth to me, so don't expect me to feel bad for her."

I quieted down, but the damage had been done. My little girls began to stir. Heavy sleepers, just like their father, they are. "For all of her and her predecessor's talk of my importance they have the nasty habit of not being there when the Web's precious _'Center'_ needed them, needed _anyone at all._ , and it's starting to tick. Me. _Off_."

"Daddy?"

The door creaked open, and there was Leah with wide doe eyes, holding Mayday's hand, and I could see it at that moment - my two little girls all grown up. Leah would be a guardian, a stalwart protector, and Mayday, as tightly as she hung to her sister's leg, wouldn't be the standoffish, rebellious teen like so many when she grew up - she'd be the most mature, most understanding girl ever, and I would love them both to death, as many times over as it took.

The look of fear in their eyes was the worst punch to the gut I ever felt. It wasn't supposed to exist. Not here, and that is how I knew something was wrong.

That's the funny thing about the after-life – it's the realm of the dead. So when someone who isn't dead, or shouldn't be, ends up there, it throws things for a loop, messes with the reception and pixels out the picture. A real spanner in the works.

I was before them before I even knew it, hugging them. I didn't need eyes in the back of my head to know Strange looked like the worst man to walk the Earth, but I saw it anyway. _Good_.

No, I soothed the growing feeling of annoyance, though. My problem wasn't with him. Strange was a good man.

I kissed my daughters on their heads. "Daddy's just realizing how good his life really is," I said, smiling at the thought. My after-life is great. Amazing. My _life_ was a jealous bitch, apparently.

I sat down and bid my little girls to do the same. Whatever the Doc had to say, he could say in front of them. I hoped that maybe, just maybe, they'd scare him off.

"Julia has a daughter," I said with a voice that sounded confident. I had to be for my kids. I'm Spider-Man, better act like it. Time to play. "And you know something? She's never had to watch her little girl die. _Twice."_

Peter Parker's kids are as tough as they come. They don't flinch when they heard mention of their death, but they hugged their daddy because they _knew_ how much it tore him up inside to remember it. Best. Kids. Ever.

"That is true, my friend. She also fully understands the gravity of the situation, the pain. Taking you from your children isn't something we want to do, however..."

"Spit it out Doc."

"You were not supposed to die. Your body lives, and so must you. Your soul was ousted from your mortal coil and forced to the next plane, but as of yet, you do not belong here." He looked at me sadly. "You have a life to live, a _good_ life. You deserve to have it back."

All I heard were deeper and deeper notes on a grand piano, and the feeling in my gut wasn't getting better. The hugs were, and I held on to them like they were the last ones I'd ever feel.

"And what happens if I stay?" I asked, but knew I wouldn't like the answer.

"You will not be forced out," Strange said, trying to be comforting, but I could tell from his tone that he hadn't even dropped the other shoe. "But, if Heaven is behind the gates, you will be forced to wait out of them until your body passes along."

The thought that that's the fate that happens to comatose people hit me with the surprise of a tap dancing dog and a boxing mouse. I wondered if the waiting lobby for heaven had comfortable chairs. "…Can you kill Octavius?"

Oh, I was completely serious. Faced with the prospect of leaving my loved ones and being forced to watch them from afar because Otto was using me like a puppet did wonders to lower my opinion of him.

For what it's worth, the good Doctor looked like he had considered it. He shook his head, eyes closed and mouth pursed. "I cannot," he said, and there went my threat of siccing the Sorcerer Supreme on anyone who fucked with my family.

"How long has it been?" I asked. "Since he did me the best favor ever," I added with only slight sarcasm, and looked at my daughters, who tried to smile.

They had shrunk behind me as if Strange was the scariest thing ever, and in a way, it warmed my heart. Someone had come to take their father away. At the same time, it made me stand tall and shield them. Never underestimate a Father's love for his kids.

I stared at him, hard, and noticed something. Strange didn't _glow_. My family did, Jean and Silver and Mattie and George Stacey, they all did. My kids were the brightest. They could walk into the dark and light it up, and as a matter of fact no room in my home was dark when they stepped in.

For the first time, I realized that I didn't have that either, not at the same level. Mine was faint, almost non-existent, and I could have sworn it was brighter before. An obvious divide. The possibility hit home like a ball being tossed by the Hulk. I didn't belong here. What if they were staring at Strange because he was so different? I had no idea what Strange looked like to them, maybe a monster or a devilish, uncouth fiend, but I was glad they didn't see me like that.

A soothing feeling came over me. They couldn't, so stop worrying, Parker.

"A little over a year," Strange replied.

I blinked. A lifetime of good times in the space of a year? What a deal. Sign me up for the full package, please.

I smiled ruefully and took a long, meaningful look at my daughters. "Give it to me straight, Doc – how has Otto fucked my corpse over now? Did he try to sleep with May, again?" I asked, and felt Leah blink into my back. This would, in fact, be the reason why became so protective of Mayday later in the after-life, almost as much as me. And part of the reason why she hated anyone named Otto, and _loathed_ octopi.

"Did he take the symbiote and torture it? Did he whizz on my Uncle's grave?"

"It would be better if I showed you." Strange sighed.

The next thing I knew, his finger was touching my head. My spider-sense went haywire. _You're not going to like this_ , it seemed to ring, and it was right.

I had never wanted to strangle someone _so much_ until that day. Hard to do for a not-dead man without a body, in Heaven, but I was _Spider-Man_ , so I was confident I could manage it.

* * *

"I am going to hurt him," I said quietly, for the fortieth time.

As if sensing my distress, the entirety of my family, my friends, had come running. The memories had passed through everyone's minds. Ben, Dad, Mom, Uncle Ben, my Grandfather, George Stacy, Ned Leeds, Mattie Franklin, Silver Sable, Jean DeWolfe. Hell, I was surprised to see Gwen there. She had taken to peering through the window or peeking past trees to see me.

But there they all were, watching me take a nearby tree and rip it from the ground like tissue and slowly grind it to dust with my bare hands. And it warmed my heart. How many times had I been in a tough spot only to find myself alone? Well, not here. My family and friends were at my back.

And they did not look pleased. Negative emotions are contagious, I told you.

One by one, everyone joined me at the tree and beat at it and kicked it with everything they had, suddenly imbued with spider-strength and imagining the face of one Otto Octavius in the place of the poor tree. Leah and Mayday were right next to me, doing their best.

One big happy pissed off Spider-Family. The thought was as comforting as thinking of Uncle Ben giving a spider-powered kick to Octavius's crotch while my Father held him still and there was a line behind Ben.

I lost it when I saw what Otto did to Felicia. I went into the house tossed Uncle Ben's chair through the wall and into the backyard when I saw how he treated Kaine. I put my foot through the sidewalk like the cheapest drywall when I saw how he treated and dismantled every single accomplishment that Peter Parker ever made, derided and looked down on it, all in the name of being the better Spider-Man. The 'Superior Spider-Man.'

I watched him get haunted by what remained of my mind. My soul was gone, but part of my mind still remained, like ghost files on a computer. I watched him desecrate my Uncle's memory and erase anything that Peter Parker ever was, in the name of his own 'victory'.

I watched him try to have sex with Mary Jane. Did that count as mutual attempted rape?

Hell, I watched him abduct the symbiote, and my estimate of _torture_ wasn't far off. It still _felt_ for me in a way I had never comprehended. Like how I felt for Gwen when I was alive, it _yearned_ for me. That yearning turned into something ugly, something worse than obsession, and created Venom, and as desperate as it was for me, it still recoiled in disgust at finding not Peter Parker, but Otto Octavius in his place.

Otto basically chained it up and used it to further his goals of becoming the Superior Spider-Man and fought the Avengers. It had come close to figuring out what was wrong, I could feel from the memories it knew that its 'first host' was 'wrong', but Otto deliberately used it like a tool, treating it like a thing, an object instead of a living, sentient creature, uncaring of the two way bond between host and symbiote.

Which is how we get to the tree. I stared small, only digging my fingers up and down the trunk as my family watched from the doorway, my old friends watched from the street. The symbiote was like a child, and the knowledge that I had _abandoned_ it after saving it made me angry at myself. It was as if I had abandoned Leah, or left Gwen to die on purpose, uncaring. And seeing how Otto treated it only exacerbated my mood.

I picked up the tree like a paper weight and broke it in half over my knee. Ben was there and took one half and broke that in half, and both he and Uncle Ben lobbed it into the sky, launching it into orbit. The family that gets pissed off together.

I want to say, again, that the look on Strange's face when he found me in the realm of the dead? _Priceless_. The look on his face when he realized he incited a family of sudden spider-powered individuals from the smallest child to the oldest man to rage? I wish I had my camera, because that picture would have been the background for my computer forever.

Now, Doctor Stephen Strange is the Sorcerer Supreme, and aside from a really impressive title, and it allows him some pretty fantastic, you might even say amazing, feats. Chief of which, in my experience, is bringing me from pure nothingness and the void at the end of all things all the way to my death and my beginning simultaneously.

Then dragging me through _every single fight_ I have ever had in my life up to that point. Screw fantastic that is _amazing_ \- amazingly painful.

Speaking with the dead is one of these, and though he doesn't do it a lot, he's a good friend to me. My being half in, half out, as it were, made it easier than it should have been.

Strange felt responsible, and I'm the poster boy for what responsibility can do to you. If my family's lectures to me since I arrived taught me anything, it's that too much of a less-than-good thing was very, very bad. Not only shouldn't you do drugs, kids, don't do hard responsibility. Unless you want to die in your twenties and see all of your loved ones at the pearly gates.

So I had wiped that off the table, put an end to it. I echoed Uncle Ben's, everyone's, words repeatedly and in this, I was able to say with conviction that my death was not the Doc's fault. It never was, and though he was far away from my favorite person right then, the fact that he was here to keep me from looking longingly past heavenly gates to see my family meant _so_ much, no matter if I resented him a little for it.

Because if he hadn't, I would have been stuck outside until Otto got me killed. Again. I ironically hoped that would be soon and, as I found out, it could have been sooner that I thought had things played out.

The Superior Spider-Man had gotten himself into a bit of an accident. After seeing how he treated him, I wanted to believe he ran afoul of Kaine's fist. Again. But he had actually collapsed under pressure. The Green Goblin was back, again, somehow, and underminded his entire big brother routine. I happy, not surprised, and in a petty, vindictive, absolutely justified way. Because there's Parker luck, and then there's super-villainy luck that's more akin to a monkey with a wrench

This, coupled with a much too late message from a comatose Julia Carpenter via astral projection, got the good Doctor to see what was up with the not-so-friendly neighborhood Spider-Man, why he had suddenly changed in recent months. I didn't bother to ask what took her so long. That wasn't a headache I was willing to indulge.

When Strange arrived, he found Otto receded into his own mind, and, as it turned out, searching through a destroyed mindscape for little ol' me to stick me with the mess he found himself in. Unfortunately for the tubby bowl haired bastard, it wasn't that _easy_.

Not only had Otto swapped minds with me, and I mean full on teleported our brains to each other's bodies because he's that smart, bringing out a twisted version of death for Peter Parker as I died in his body, he had also scrapped every last memory of mine. Anything that was a remnant of me that he didn't memorize was gone.

So, when you delete all of the restore points, there's no other time on your computer to restore to, regardless if you backed up certain files onto a flash drive. Otto was stuck as the Superior Spider-Man for good and there wasn't a thing he could do about it.

But he didn't realize that. When your computer is so _fucked up_ all you can do is reinstall, Otto was going to use what small fragment of my backed up memories to bring me _'back'._ I saw his thoughts. He had a heartfelt speech and _everything_.

In the words of Kaine, "What the _fuck_."

Otto's perception of me was such that the remnant would have been guilty, _remorseful_ even, that Otto had to die for Peter Parker to live. Leave it to Octavius to go out like that, thinking of himself as the hero. Even in death he planned to stroke his ego one last time.

It was lucky Strange came along when he did because I shudder to think what would have happened if Otto had given control to a mental fragment of myself that was _less_ me than he was. With only the handful of memories Otto had of Peter Parker's life, and Otto's perception of him, if he had erased his own consciousness, what remained would have been a fucking _idiot_. Think a computer, without any of the meaningful files to do anything - it sits and bumbles. Considering Otto's state of being at the time to even consider something so _stupid,_ that was saying a lot.

Now in my life I have seen some amazing things. Beautiful women naked. Beautiful women naked on top of me, beautiful women damn near naked while wearing my t-shirt on top of me. In the afterlife, two beautiful women naked and on top of me at the same time. The t-shirt broke,

My Uncle, my parent's smiles. My children take the cake most of all. Al of these things are amazing.

But when Strange strut his mystic stuff, _Joy to the World_ should have been playing, because I'll _never_ forget what happened.

Out of the ether, much in the same way Strange himself had arrived, came the subdued and writhing soul of Otto Octavius. A few dozen feet above our house, which I thought was a nice touch. He dropped like a sack of rocks onto the roof, rolled off and right to my feet.

I grinned viciously. "Doc, you know how to bring a smile to my face. Reed can take a backseat because you're my favorite."

From what I was told, souls are delicate things. Pure or corrupt given the person, with only a few rare situations allowing for certain interactions with them… like taking the soul out of its body, like Strange did to Otto. But that was the kicker: it wasn't _his_ body.

The only way a soul may inhabit a body, therefor, is willingly, like when the body is empty of their own soul, effectively a walking, rapidly decomposing corpse, or if the mind is weak enough or unaware of it being possessed. Forceful possession, therefor, was a _big_ no-no, complete with a capital _'You Fucked Up_ '.

Octavius had done that in spades.

By forcing my own into limbo, and just about killing me altogether for his own ends, in cold blood no less, his deeds had forfeited any of the soulful protection period, and since he didn't belong in my body, Strange had plucked him out of my body like a short, fat, bowl-haircut having despot with a flair for the grandiose.

I was _clean_. My family was clean. I was aware of my parent's history, secret agents and SHIELD's top agents at that, and we were all well-groomed and clean looking, the spiritual evidence of lives well lived, good deeds and belief in something other than ourselves. Love.

Being dead came with a resolute certainty; the certainty that your time has come and it's time to move on, that you will see your loved ones once again, that, if you end up in the place upstairs, you've lived a good life, you deserve this, and _this_ is why you do.

It also provides a troubling sense of introspection that allows you to see your strengths and flaws. The fact that I was naïve and lowly in spirit hit me upside the head like a wrecking ball, not just the words of a loving family. Confidence, belief in oneself, is a very important thing and affects you deeply, and I saw with startling clarity how it had affected my life, along with a poisonous affliction of guilt that mutated from an understandable survivor's guilt to something worse.

It was with this in mind that I saw Octavius. Any thoughts I once had that the man was redeemable were definitively gone. His confidence had turned into arrogance. His guilt was near non-existent, drowned out by ludicrous justifications.

Held the world by the short and curlies? He deserved to be remembered and lauded as a hero! _His_ _genius had to be remembered!_

Damned Spider-Man to a wilting death with no one the wiser? Who cares, _Otto Octavius_ _deserved a second chance_ _._

Et cetera.

If being a good person makes you clean and respectably dressed, the opposite made you a bum, a despot, a piece of trash, and Otto was that in spades. This isn't just my opinion of him, he was pathetic looking; his clothes were raggedy and he was dirty all over, skin caked in dirt and with an awful smell about him. This was the man that was willing to kill so many to satiate his ego, a man whose arrogance was comparable to Doom's ego but without the integrity, and whose ego made him scoff at Doom's accomplishments. The man who had held the world hostage and was willing to boil it _alive_.

And I laughed in his face. Had I just been given the chance to play the after-life equivalent of whack-a-mole? I was certainly eager to find out.

And all of that heartfelt admittance Otto would have given to my fragment? That was gone. Back was his usual spiel, and Doctor Octopus where he belonged, in his pathetic self. I guffawed back as his began his tirade. Just like old times.

 _"Parker!"_ He snarled, looking around us. "You're dead! Defeated by _my_ hand, you pathetic excuse for a hero! You should be thanking me that I assumed your life! I am your _better,_ I am the _Superior-"_ and his eyes fell upon Ben, and he sneered at him. "Another _clone,_ an abomination. I remember you… Reilly. Just as much of a pitiful Spider-Man as Kaine tries to be."

He spat at our feet. Ben and I shared a look. This was going be nostalgic.

"It's good you still remember your betters, Otto, it means there's hope for you yet," I said dismissively. Suddenly there I was, clad in my red and blues. I didn't even need to think of what to do next. "In case you've forgotten sarcasm after getting your butt kicked by our _brother,_ that was a grade-A cut. I didn't mean what I said though sweetheart, we _shouldn't_ fight."

"Brother," Octavius scoffed, "Truly your loathsome self runs in your pitiful family," he said, looking at all of us.

Ben was right beside me in his own suit. At the same time we added webbing to his magically entangled form and shot little balls of webbing at his face. "Yeah, you can shut up now. We really shouldn't fight, Squiddy. What will the _children_ think?"

"That we should get the camera, for one," a voice said beside me. I looked to my side and a look of pride bloomed in my heart. There was Mayday and Leah, all grown up. Mayday was clad in Ben's suit, and Leah in a white variation of my stealth suit.

"And upload the video to every single site there is," Leah said with a derisive chuckle, and they pelted him with webbing like one would skip rocks on a lake. A real family gathering.

"Show everyone what happens when you fuck with my Grandson," my grandfather said, outfitted with webshooters. Uncle Ben and my parents, too. My father pulled out a gun. My mother pulled out two, and took aim. I watched as they shot Ben's paralytic stingers out of them like semi-automatic pistols, ripping through the webbing that caked up with the force of a high caliber round. An interesting idea to be sure. Mattie was there, Silver, George Stacy and Gwen, Ned Leeds, everyone.

"Now," I found Jean DeWolfe's arm around my neck, and she lightly kicked Otto in the head. "How bout you show us how a real webslinging ass kicking is done, Spidey? It's been so long since I watched you."

She was a woman after my own heart.

* * *

"Even in death I can't escape the villainous monologues," I said, choking out a laugh. I looked at my hand and watched the glow flicker. Before me, on Ben, it was as bright as it had ever been.

I was the odd one out and strangely, I was okay with that. Happy. Being with family does that.

"Ugh, tell me about it. I could have gone twenty more years without hearing one of those." Ben agreed.

"I needed that," I said with a sigh, looking at Otto's battered and beaten form webbed up on the ceiling, the result of a maximum spider assault. "Remember the good old days? The simpler times?"

"Whatever happened to those?" Ben laughed.

"I think they went out the door with my teens," I huffed. "Probably sooner. To be honest, though," I smiled, looking at the room around us. Everyone was there. "Sometimes I wouldn't change a thing."

"I heard that." Ben grinned. Unfortunately with his spider-suit his hair had come back, but you can't win them all.

We sat on the wall of the kitchen, still clad in our suits. The room was stuffed to full occupancy with everyone there and Otto dangled in a little cocoon as Grandpa Will pelted him with spit balls. In front of us, little Mayday and Leah had become two young women, and thanks to that after-life certainty, I was positive and beyond a shadow of a doubt that they would have taken up after me. I would have found a way to give Leah powers, she and her sister would have been Spider-Women, and there was no doubt in my mind that they would have been proud to.

And the thought warmed my heart. When I got back, I would be there for them, with them, every step of the way. What kid wouldn't want Spider-Man for a Dad, right?

They hung on two weblines as I had done countless times in the past, and Mayday was munching on a sandwich. "I don't understand how you put up with it, I really don't. I'd web every villain's mouth shut the second I saw them on principle!"

"I think it's funny," Leah said, trying to shrug and finding her body dipping to the ground from it. "You could record them and play their voices back to them. 'Hey, this is how stupid you sound'!"

"You get used to it quick," I said, "But I thought being dead would keep me from dealing with it anymore. It gets _really_ tired."

Mayday started to rub her head, just like her dad. Leah began to whistle, badly, and with a sneaking suspicion I looked around the room and saw everyone not meeting my eyes.

"About that…" Ben began.

"You knew." I said, sighing. "That I wasn't dead. That I didn't belong here."

"You do belong here, sweetie," my mother cooed. "With us."

"Some place you can rest and be happy," my father continued.

Silver looked at me sadly, unable to meet my eyes. "It just isn't your time yet."

"Dad," Mayday said, and I looked into the bright green eyes of my daughter. I never wanted to see her look so hurt, so guilty, so sad. No father does. "We just wanted you to be happy."

"We just wanted our dad, even for a little bit," Leah mumbled.

"Our son," Uncle Ben said, smiling at me serenely.

"Our idol," Mattie whispered.

"Our _hero,"_ Jean said.

I looked down at the floor, but couldn't hold my gaze there for long. All eyes were on me and I just couldn't help but smile. "I know. Thanks."

Fun fact about my life: it's… a ride. I became a cynical version of myself thanks to it. _Gee, Parker, when will the next drop happen? How far?_

But it always seemed like there was someone there to pick me up and say something to just make me think, "God, am I _so_ grateful to have you." It's the only reason I lasted as long as I did. _Someone_ to fight for, someone to _see_ again, someone to look up to, and rarely, someone to pick me up when I fell.

As crucial as the differences between Peter Parker and Ben Reilly are, the same things drive us, and at the end of the day, Peter Parker has had some pretty _amazing_ people in his life. The more things change, I guess, and not much had changed in the after-life.

I swallowed like I had a dumbbell in my throat. My eyes heated up, vision turning blurry. Don't _cry_ Parker, that's the sign of a quitter, a sore loser. _The game's still on_. They want an _encore._ "I'm going to miss you. Every. Single. One. Of. You."

Every single face on that room was looking at me. In my nightmares it had been accusing glares. "We're dead because of you." They said.

Here? Nothing but smiles. Nothing but, "Have a good time Dad," or "Give it to em good, Pete," or "Have _fun_."

I was on the floor before I knew it and going from hug to hug, kiss to kiss like a dream that went by too quickly. Then I was at the door and Uncle Ben walked up to me, still smiling that unbeatable, unbreakable smile. The one that got me out of bed on my worst days. "You know what I'm going to say, kiddo."

"So proud of me," I smiled weakly, eyes glistening.

"Got it in one." He got me in the best hug ever, and wouldn't let go. "Never forget that Peter. Never forget that."

Leah and Mayday walked up, handing me my mask and webshooters. Their smiles were wide and true. I'd see them again. "Go give it to em like only our father can," Leah grinned.

"Like Spider-Man can," Mayday echoed.

"The one and only." Ben smiled guiltily. "More or less. Have fun, brother."

I nodded, and there was Doctor Strange next to me, right by the door. It opened, and outside it was dark. I looked down the road and saw it wet and lit by streetlights, but quiet. "I'll be seeing you again," I whispered, almost unsure. "Right?"

Jean scoffed. "You better."

"Just… not too soon, please," Silver smiled knowingly.

"Have fun, son," my father said, holding my mother.

"Tell our brother how proud of him we are, Pete!" Ben said, smiling softly. "For me."

" _And kick some ass!_ " Grandpa yelled.

"Show them how my baby boy gets it _done,"_ my mom said, on the verge of tears.

Doctor Strange looked at me. His expression cleared up and I could tell he no longer looked as torn, but the guilt was still there. That was fine. "Thanks, Doc."

He smiled thinly. "I'd say it was my pleasure, but I do believe that would be in bad form." I snorted, and with a wave of his hand, Otto was ripped from the ceiling and floated to us. We stepped out into the darkness of the street, and the door shut behind us.

It was quiet out. Not too quiet, not silent, but… serene. It was marred by Otto's screams, but they didn't bother me a bit. "So what's going to happen to him?" I asked.

"He will be judged for his deeds, I would assume. And then rewarded accordingly. His mortal coil has expired, and death waits for him," Strange said dryly. I had no objections

. Otto's eyes were wide and terrified, but I reassured him. "Don't worry Doc, Death is nice. Kind of the quiet type, but after dealing with me, you should like that." I wonder why that didn't seem to soothe him any, and he renewed his efforts to escape vigorously.

The smell of rain after a storm, and that smooth, easy breeze on a summer night. I was completely content with taking my time and followed Strange down a long, seemingly never ending road when the door opened and the street lit up from the lights inside.

Uncle Ben jogged up to my side and clapped me on the back. "You didn't really think we'd let you go on your own, did you?" There they all were, right behind me.

"Surprises are nice every once in a while," I laughed, and we started walking again. Some things don't change.

"Let's go, kiddo." He wrapped his arm around me as we walked, on and on, until and the streetlights stopped appearing and it began to get darker. I blinked, and looked around, but there was nothing there but me. Strange and Octavius were gone, and I suddenly felt cold. I was alone.

 _No_ , I thought, determined. I wasn't. I wasn't alone. I never was. In the dark I could see their faces, smiling and waving. I could hear Ben's voice. _"You did good kid,"_ he said. Then he was gone. Like a wisp. Some things don't change.

I refused to sigh. I smiled, I grinned, and grinned wider when I heard the last scream of Doctor Octopus, and then I put my mask on.

Time to get out there and play like it means something.

I opened my eyes.

* * *

I reached out, trying to feel them, any of them, but they were gone like a dream. I watched, confused, as an unfamiliar hand was splayed out in front of me and made a fist. Not a dream, just… a reward. I swallowed and got up, squared my shoulders and looked ahead.

What mess did the Amazing Spider-Man have to clean up now? What mess do you have for me this time, Otto?

I had a fair idea, and cracked my neck. Alright.

" _My turn_."

 **A/N: I always found it frustrating how Peter's death was just swept under the rug. He passed on, saw Ben and everything, but somehow came back from a fragment of memory, and wasn't perturbed in the slightest at Otto for what he had done.**

 **I hope you enjoyed. This was just something that popped up in my head. It gets lighter. Possibly worse.**


	2. Chapter 2: AMM

**Odd idea MK. II**

 **I always liked Anna Maria. She was one of the few things I enjoyed about Superior. Her and Peter seem to get along well enough in the latest volume, but once more, she never showed the requisite disgust or even shock for being lied to by a man who** _ **tried to murder the world**_ **.**

 **Anyways, didn't plan the heavy-petting to go into lemon territory, so, yeah. That's what the rating is for.**

 **Chapter 2: Anna Maria Marconi**

* * *

My name is Peter Parker, and I used to be Spider-Man. I'm on a break now.

No, really.

After cleaning up Otto's mess, something that was remarkably easy with Doctor Strange and Miguel O'Hara's help, I went kind of overboard.

 _Normy_! That ol' scamp not only changed his face, but he tried to get away from me. By running. When not one, but two Spider-Men, one considerably more amazing than the other, were after him. The dumbest idea in the history of dumb ideas.

Frankly, the Sorcerer Supreme being there was just overkill. That's the kind of overkill that I like.

Norman was a wild card that I had been dealt too much, and dealt with too much. He had escaped from prison too much, been let out too much, killed my sibling too much, orchestrated too much, had died and come back _too_ much.

He was a _cockroach_ , extremely hard to get rid of, and if he was capable of fooling the entire country when it was known exactly the type of things he had done, then I had not only had no choice, I had no faith in locking him up.

Norman deserved to die, but looking at him I didn't see the death of Ben Reilly or countless others. I was at peace, all the things considered, and Norman wasn't worth an iota of the effort it would have taken to _start_ to feel offense, now.

I could have killed him, I really, really could have and Miguel and Strange wouldn't have lifted a finger to stop me. But Norman's frightening moments of lucidity, like when he looked up, realized _I_ was me, or realizes that it's all not just some game anymore, have bad timing.

Or maybe he was just a sociopath that just knew how to get to me. This possibility surprises me even less.

But Norman, together with the Green Goblin, was too unpredictable to leave alone. Not again. So at my request, after curing him with the same serum we ended up using to revert Carlie Cooper back to her usual self, the good Doctor took that odd little psyche of Norman's and folded it into a _neat_ little square.

Norman was effectively locked inside his own mind as a favor to me - let me tell you, having the Sorcerer Supreme at your back? Spectacular.

I hoped it would stick more than the previous punishments, but at the very least your run of the mill psychic wouldn't be able to get him out, so Strange assured me.

I trusted Strange implicitly, all things considered. He'd gone above and beyond for me, quite literally, and had consistently proven his desire to earn my trust back. To me, he had done so when he tossed Otto to whatever spiritual judgment he had in store, when he had chosen to save me from standing outside of heaven and being forced to wait for death so I could see my family, when he brought me back from the end of all things.

Strange was in my corner and he was batting one thousand, and I was a captive audience with a smile on my face. He was the Sorcerer Supreme for a reason, and it was my hope that, if nothing else, the use of magic would buffer any attempts of say, an evil version of a reanimated Charles Xavier from unlocking Norman's mind at some point in the future.

Thoughts of rogue, mercenary psychics aside, folding Normy's little mind was more humane than killing… but at the same time it was exactly what he deserved. Now Norman Osborn's mind was empty save for a tiny little box where his twisted self was now located. He was living in his own little world, little more than a vegetable _,_ and to top it all off, no one knew it was Norman Osborn.

People may have had their suspicions, but _Banks, Mason_ , had been admitted into the hospital later that day without anyone to claim him. Menace and the Hobgoblin, Phil Urich, escaped, but I wasn't worried. Menace was obsessed with Osborn, his little right hand twist, and Phil was a mercenary. The one would be helpless without Osborn ordering her around, and Phil would pop up eventually, gone to the highest bidder. When he did, I'd be there.

Next came the problem of explaining everything to the Avengers. I didn't bother.

Late as usual, they came up once everything calmed down. I wasn't there to greet them. I would explain what happened eventually, but not about myself – I didn't needto explain myself to them when I was the one that deserved an explanation.

Specifically, how none of them took notice of the fact that someone had body snatched me, but _Norman_ did. I wasn't going to forget that delightful little tidbit any time soon, no matter how 'heartwarming' it may be.

Unfortunately and unsurprisingly, that wasn't all there was to the fallout. The city not only saw Spider-Man as the man that went off the deep end and held it hostage and fought the Avengers like your stereotypical supervillain, it also saw him as the man who willfully ignored their cries for help as Osborn's gang terrorized the city and essentially abandoned them when this happened. Then, there he was wiping the streets with the Goblins, but the damage had already been done. Repeatedly.

Jameson had a field day. His new spider-slayers roamed the streets; their official designation was to help law enforcement deal with the Goblin gang and help with repairs, but their purpose was obvious. He still called them 'Spider-Slayers' and his name was _J. Jonah Jameson_. The guy whose coffee mug said "I Hate Spider-Man."

It's safe to say that he had a field _week_ , all the way until I left the city. Even after I left Earth, I think he was _still_ complaining. I did end up giving him a lot to complain about.

Luckily I wasn't entirely alone. Miguel O'Hara was in my corner; I had known the Spider-Man of 2099 for a while, and pretty well too. For him, it'd been in the space of two years getting to know a man near a century his senior, for me it had been around five. He's not the biggest talker.

 _Evidently,_ in the time we'd known each other, he knew me better than heroes and friends I've known for twice as long. Miguel and I _had_ been through a bunch of scraps together, from being tossed around the universe and meeting alternate universe versions of me, to fighting a slightly evil, but mostly deluded older me from 2099, but _still_.

Miguel had definitely jumped feet first into the weird life and title of Spider-Man. He had seen enough, trusted in me enough, to fully accept my story. As a matter of fact, he worried if my luck was contagious.

"Is your luck a Spider-Man thing, or just you? Shock, I hope we're not related. If it's hereditary, then…"

I thought of Ben and Kaine and couldn't come up with a good answer. "…I think it's a bit of both." I had replied.

"No offense, but I really hope we're not related."

"None taken. For your sake, I hope so too."

I confided in Miguel. When I told him I was actually _dead_ , and in heaven and everything, he was shocked.

And if _shock_ is the futuristic equivalent of _fuck_ then it is still applicable, because that was his expression. It drove home the point that for a _year_ someone was wearing my skin and living my life, and aside from a veritable handful of people, no one had _noticed_.

Miguel was one of those who had, and I was relieved to give him his due credit. He _had_ noticed right from the second he ended up in my time that something was wrong. The first meeting he'd had with the 'Superior Spider-Man'. Miguel was apparently _far_ more familiar with the contemporary genuine article and how an imposter does than my fellow teammates… and he wasn't even a part of my fanclub, I don't think.

But the Superior Spider-Man avoided him like the plague, and he wasn't close to Peter Parker, and it was only through a handful of encounters that his suspicion had reached the tipping point, leading into a confrontation that ended up with the both of them captured by Jameson's spider-slayers before Otto left him high and dry.

Under the circumstances, noticing the discrepancies was impressive. Miguel and I _totally_ became Spider-Brothers at that point. He hates that name.

This all occurred as a conversation told as conversations are told best. Beating the snot out of and breaking something – in this case it was very expensive robots. I had become the Spider-Delinquent, apparently.

It wasn't an entirely bad conversation though. Miguel was extremely relieved to know that heaven existed, and I was touched that he trusted my word that much. It was something to shoot for, and I agreed wholeheartedly.

Elsewhere, I had the city against me again, so… that was nothing new. I was still me, and I was back and eager to reclaim my life with all of the relief and closure being literally dead had brought me. That was kind of difficult to do when Otto had erected _Parker Industries_.

It was a company that made me roll my eyes at the arrogance of the name. Leave it to Otto to impress his ego upon everyone else, even if it was technically in my name, and in his death as well as mine. I was saddled with not only Otto's mess now, but his responsibilities too.

I didn't know what to do. Despite the knowledge of my future CEO-of-Alchemax-self taunting me that I did, in fact, know how to run a company, did have that ability, I didn't think I had the capability. But, I was never anything if I wasn't stubborn and unable to back down.

But that wasn't the end of my inner troubles. If I wasn't angry at _anyone_ else then I was absolutely disbelieving at _everyone_. From May, who was now back to deriding Spider-Man at every turn as if he had never done anything good, to what I felt was worse: not seeing the obvious change in Peter Parker. The woman who raised me was able to tell when I was being imitated by the Chameleon, for Christ's sake, and I've been putting up with her opinion of Spider-Man since I was fifteen.

MJ got tired of the life I lived and simply _left_ , after everything else, when I needed a shoulder to lean on the most. Carlie Cooper walked out as well.

Once more, the heroes I fought alongside had noticed nothing _,_ and now blamed me for it. Granted, it was due to ignorance, but my point still stands. Their only suspicions had been soothed by machine testing when they know several different ways of being mind-controlled, and have themselves been mind-controlled or possessed by Octavius himself!

 _Logan_ had suspected something, at least. Had the right idea siccing a telepath on Otto, too, and unsurprisingly, Otto smashing his face into the pavement helped those suspicions. Logan could smell that Otto was wrong, but Ock's instinct for self-preservation is as big as his ego. He avoided that too, and that was the end of it.

… Really?

I started to make a list: Who caught on to the fact that I was dead. Let's see… A woman a coma _,_ for all the good it had done me. A man from the future. One of my _worst enemies._ And a Doctor who only found out for sure when he was literally knocking on a dead man's door and staring him in the face _._

You _cannot_ make this shit up.

Unsurprisingly, Jameson descended into a full on hunt for Spider-Man with his slayers, for all the good it did him. He claimed he had been blackmailed by Spider-Man, and before even taking into account the shady things JJJ had done in the past, I didn't care in the slightest.

I had an axe to grind myself and the Spider-Slayers were the perfect stress-toys. They were child's play for me, thank you very much, and the scrap metal they became after I was done with them, I appropriated.

I hadn't needed Miguel's help with them, but it was a good, Spider-Brother bonding experience. I was considering on getting us matching sweaters but didn't know if he preferred cassimere or unstable molecules.

I settled on a baseball cap. The guy didn't even know what the World Series was.

Miguel was my partner in crime through it all, and among our crowning achievements were gumming up the NYC skyline, and having it stay that way, for a week in gigantic, eloquent wording. For seven days the entire city could see, " _Go fuck yourself JJJ/ Otto."_

The next was leaving a scrap-metal effigy of what remained of the slayers in his office. It was crafted in the vague image of Spider-Man, complete with a Hitler-stache and a cigar, and hung from the ceiling.

I still have the picture of Jonah's face. I think he actually liked it, because he quieted down a bit after that. Or he had a stroke.

In my free time Miguel helped me manufacture a version of that anti-grav cloak of his that he used, allowing me more control over my freefalls – I wasn't much for the half cape look, but it gave me an excuse to get my faithful web-pits again.

By myself, I was trying to piece together what was left of my life. May's rants on Spider-Man became grating extremely quickly, and I distanced myself.

There was the Horizon labs staff who felt that Peter Parker had betrayed them. They could get in line.

The thought of speaking with MJ left me feeling cold. I thought of little Mayday, could only imagine what our daughter would think she saw her just leaving like that, but took heart that at least I had her and Leah, and my entire family.

But I didn't even have that anymore. I was alive again, and I went home to an apartment I had never seen, never slept in, never known, to find myself _alone_. It was… sobering.

Making my way through the emotions that came up from this was new. Admitting I deserved to feel let down for once. _Anger, indignance,_ and _disappointment._ In my experience, indignance and bitter sarcasm makes for excellent company. I'd been through worse, but that knowledge didn't help at all.

But I would see my family again, could still see them, and that was more than enough for me. That helped, and because of it, because of them, my happiness returned when it mattered most. I slept better than I had in years.

Finally, there was poor Anna Maria Marconi, Otto's girlfriend. She was a darling woman, beautiful, for her size, considering, and as sharp as a tack. She was caught up in one man's lies and another's misfortune, and since saving her from the Green Goblin I had yet to speak with her.

Otto's mind had been transferred back into his own corpse and mine back into my body – it was very fortunate that Osborn had stolen Octavius's corpse, but I know Strange would have been able to pour some magical mumbo jumbo to get me back into sorts.

As it was, I did not know Anna. I had seen glimpses of her relationship with Otto, but none of the grueling particulars. All I knew was that she was one of Otto's last thoughts, and I was forced to begrudgingly admit that for all of his faults, the man did have a heart… somewhere.

He cared for her and, knowing she was in danger, he thought desperately for her. All while searching frantically for some fragment of Peter Parker to shove his duties off onto and do his job so he could save Anna. What a guy.

Making it all the more difficult was that she showed a care for Peter Parker that I hadn't expected, but sorely envied and desperately needed when no one else in Parker's life seemed to possess.

So I had avoided her. With my mind back where it belonged, Otto's memories were just gone. The last living memory _I_ had was my death in _his_ body, with him standing over me; so, the shock of coming back to life and finding out that everything has changed, your friends either walked out on you or didn't notice you had been body snatched was compounded to the fact that I now had an unknown in my life – a woman who apparently so cared for _Peter Parker_ that she'd been driven to tears at the thought of him being in danger, but who was _unknown_ to Peter Parker.

The shock was substantial, and to say I was apprehensive was putting it lightly. Multiply that by one-hundred.

I would still have to eventually face the Avengers, the superhero community at large. I was being childish, I knew that, but I had reason for it. My reputation being put into question by others was widely known and probably unsurprising, but I was also Spider-Man, and my reputation for making it through difficult times wasn't simply because of propriety.

I would deal with all of that. Just not then. I needed a break.

But Anna Maria didn't deserve to be strung along. She was a woman caught between one man's lies and another's misfortune, and none of this was her fault.

I had _learned_ , and if nothing else, I had a responsibility to myself not to let this get big enough to blow up in my face.

With great power… I had power over my life, but that also meant I had responsibility for it too. Great responsibility… to _myself_. To handle my own affairs so that not only would those near me would not suffer, but so that I would not either.

Mary Jane, at least, wouldn't have to worry about that anymore. She had made a good argument. I wished her the best.

It was on a day that the streets had been cleaner than they had in months, Otto's Big Brother program aside. Miguel was adjusting to being in the past at my suggestion, becoming more familiar with the city, and as such, I decided it was time to prioritize my goals.

He took patrol for me and I, for once, was catching up on a much needed break. I waited until four in the afternoon to bite the bullet, one of several, and called Anna Maria over to my apartment.

It… didn't exactly go how I expected it to. But who says that's a bad thing?

* * *

Anna Maria Marconi was a brilliant woman. Since I've fought long and hard to obtain the good habit of giving myself credit where it's due, I won't say she's smarter than I am, but in her chosen field, she _is_ brilliant. As it was, we were in different fields. My passions may have lay with a wide array of sciences but the chief of them was biochemistry. I had long ago suspected it was Otto's passions for his chosen fields that attracted her, but was proven wrong.

Anna Maria, while attracted to intelligence in general, was attracted to _Peter Parker_ , and more specifically, his history. I take no shame in admitting Otto's intellect and behavior had kept her interested in a confused way, esoteric as it was to how Mr. Parker was said to behave and how he actually did; after all, it's not something I could exactly help.

She's also a hell of a damn cook, too, and loyal to a fault. She'll stay with you while building burns down if you refuse to move, and go out with a healthy dose of sarcasm. It's refreshing.

At the time I briefly wondered how a man like Otto had managed to attract her. Of course, he hadn't – Peter Parker had. Along with stealing my life, Otto had stolen my body, and all of the perks that came along with it, including my physique and my relationships, the latter of which he had systematically rendered null.

My confidence in myself had never been good. I was past humble, apathetic to my good points – the fruits of 'guilt-full' labor, a life blaming myself for Ben's death and everyone else's. Of 'taking great responsibility'. It took my own death, the latest in a string of them, and subsequent time with my family to put an end to that.

I'm… _handsome_. I still don't enjoy saying it, but in my history enough women have told me so numerous times, and looked at me like I was.

I take no pride in it.

Okay, yes, yes I _do,_ as well as a not insignificant amount of comfort. After all, I was once the nerd from Queens with no friends. That I ended up being a late bloomer is a relief to me, but Otto Octavius couldn't say the same.

He was overly mothered, beaten by his father, and bullied. I wasn't ignorant to the similarities between us, but one or two things in common does not a parallel make. I pitied the boy that Otto had once been, but he had long ago exhausted any goodwill I had toward him.

Past that, for much of his life Otto had been overweight, and later on he had been egotistical to a fault. That he at the very least didn't pay attention to looks, probably because pickings were slim for him came as a surprise to me.

I refused to be shocked or humbled in this, though. The man killed me and stole my body. As Kaine would say, "Fuck him." It was needless to say that being Peter Parker for a year had opened new doors for him.

Anna arrived at my apartment extremely punctual and brushed past me with overt familiarity and had her arms full of groceries. She immediately went to the kitchen. While it took me a long time to get used to this new apartment, which was much nicer than my last, mind you, Anna was obviously familiar with it.

This was the apartment that Otto had rented, which I had yet to leave. It was not as difficult of a choice as I had first thought. I had wanted nothing else but to be rid of everything he brought into my life. Unfortunately, that also included Anna, but not because I had any negative feeling toward her. That she cared so much for 'Peter Parker' already put her in good standing with _Peter Parker_.

A meaningful discussion with Strange and Miguel changed my mind and I realize I was being stupid and stubborn. I'm sure any of my other friends would have said the same, but as I've mentioned before, I didn't make a habit of listening to people when it came to myself.

I could imagine Johnny Storm saying, "…You're telling me you got a fancy apartment that you didn't have to pay for… and you want to get rid of it?" He would narrow his eyes and spit fire at me. "…Are you _brain damaged_?"

Logan, however, would glare at me patiently. Patience and Logan is an oxymoron, though, so just imagine him pausing mid swig. "…" He'd shake his head and return to his bottle. "Kid, get the _fuck_ outta here."

The _point_ is that if Otto could use _my_ life to his own ends, then I could do the same. I would, and with extreme prejudice. Turnabout is fair play after all.

The suit he had made, for example, was admittedly brilliant, in a utilitarian way, so I did not scrap that. I didn't care for the color scheme at all though, and after implementing some 'minor' shape-shifting capabilities, similar to my stealth suit I had made at Horizon Labs, the suit could now change into any of the suits I'd worn in the past, but the default one was chosen with one man in mind: Ben Reilly. As far as I was concerned, if there was any ' _Superior Spider-Man'_ at all out there, it had been the man I'm proud to call my brother, blonde though his hair may be. We're not all perfect.

This was all done, of course, with the labs provided by 'Peter Parker' and materials from Parker Industries. In addition, I had grown really tired of just using the basic red and blues, cloth only. Totally not because Ben had chased me out of our home with a couch on one hand and a chair in the other for doing exactly that.

Otto had made some additions but it was still loathingly light on defensive capabilities. Using schematics from my second Spider-Armor, it hadn't been hard to add protection against high caliber firearms at all and I was banging my head against the wall for not doing it sooner.

I was able to think of all this as Anna made dinner, breakfast, and lunch at once because she just looked, and _felt_ , familiar. My mind wasn't used to seeing her work but my body was, and that was confusing. My body was used to the cues that Otto had likely developed, habits he probably didn't realize he had gained, and watching Anna flit from the sink to the stove, or stir a pot or chop vegetables was just as hypnotizing as simply watching her body _move_.

Otto had definitely cared for Anna Maria, and now my body was telling my mind that it also did by subconsciously biting my lip or impatiently tapping the table in a staccato rhythm I had never heard while I watched her move in, frankly, unfairly tight fitting yoga pants.

She had made a _feast_ and in the last few days I hadn't eaten much. I must have looked like a husk, because I certainly felt like it. But Anna worked efficiently, unobtrusively, and I just couldn't find fault with her presence. It was too familiar, too gentle, and full of concern. Every once in a while she'd look at me and stare, and I knew she could tell something was wrong. Of course, it may have been because whenever she caught me staring, my eyes had been on her ass, but that's neither here nor there.

A _lot_ of things were wrong. Looking back on it, the fact that my balls were bluer than the ocean proper probably had something to do with my staring. I was naïve then, and didn't attribute my problems to the lack of sex in my life. Kaine would say, "Peter, what the fuck."

But I wasn't the only one at fault. Her yoga pants were just _unfair,_ and I ate in silence, still trying to figure out how I was going to break it to her that I wasn't the Peter Parker she knew, which I guess isn't something Otto did. He likely talked and talked about how brilliant his ideas were.

I don't care how much truth there is to that, even Doom doesn't do that. Of course, he won't hesitate to put himself above all others, but he stows it unless prompted, which is why he's my _favorite_ megalomaniac next to Magneto, who at the very least is courteous.

My behavior was the first red flag. I could feel Anna's eyes watching me harder. The second flag was my clothes. While Otto had a closet full of formal suits and dress shirts - it seemed like he never dressed casual – I limited myself, unthinkingly, to a t-shirt and boxers. The suits were nice, and once again I had decided not to sell what technically belong to me and not me at the same time, but they just weren't… _me_.

For the first time Anna noticed that I was wearing nothing but a t-shirt and boxers, and my hair was a mess. Which exactly why she was staring at me. Leering might be a better word. Hindsight sense: twenty for twenty.

I've been Spider-Man since I was fifteen, and that's plenty of time to build up plenty of muscle. I was a far cry from the scrawny kid who got bit by a spider and gained super strength, now, and always wore long sleeved clothing for that reason. I could never showed off my body, though I hadn't the confidence or desire to do so.

There would have been far too much attention if people saw that Peter Parker, demure, nerdy kid, had exactly the same physique as Spider-Man in his skin-tight costume and was cut like a gymnast or a professional fighter. Two things I could have claimed to be, except that I didn't exactly get paid for being Spider-Man. Ever. So, 'professional' vigilante wasn't something I could put on my resume.

Anna watched me like a predator. She drooled a little, and like someone who had their brain jumpstarted, her eyes glared at me with a _hunger_ now.

Otto had his priorities on his work, obviously, because it looked as if Anna had never seen me, which was true, or him, thankfully, naked, or near naked. The latter would have made her claw her eyes out, I'm sure.

"Whoa, Slick," She said, licking her lips. She swallowed thickly. "You're… _nice_."

I paused. She had made a pretty delicious chicken soup, and French toast and a sandwich, all of which I had turned into a horrid gestalt and began eating them whole- _After_ thanking her gratefully, of course. The Parkers didn't raise a barbarian.

I snorted, dunked the half toast half sandwich abomination into the soup, currently far more concerned with my body's cries for more of her food than being watched like a piece of meat.

Any shame I might have had for my body in the past was long gone, even at that point in my life. Running around in a skintight suit does that, but I had nothing to be embarrassed about concerning my body. My hangups laid with my deeds, which, after literally coming back from the dead, I realized weren't that bad.

My romantic life? Different story. I can accurately tell you that in the previous year of my life, I didn't have much sex. Carlie Cooper, the darling gal, was as shy in the bedroom as a wallflower. She mewled and cooed, but was _delicate_.

If the way my body was reacting to Anna Maria's generous proportions, Otto hadn't taken my body for a spin either, thank _God._ So this left me, mentally, one year sex starved, and physically, two. I didn't want to know what Otto did to my body himself _._ The thought repulsed me, but not enough to stave off my appetite. I could only hope the thought of doing that made him one-hundred times more ill too.

It _would_ explain why I was feeling so pent up. 'All work, no girlfriend' wasn't the best recipe for easy nights. I had, sadly, gotten used to it.

Mouth full of an aberration of food, I blinked innocuously at Anna. Her eyes were half lidded, but I took it as surprise at my body at the time, and only that. I wasn't really smart around women.

"I… I've been hitting the gym, I guess." I said, mouth full, knowing it wasn't believable in the slightest, or if she could even understand me.

But she did, and apparently was used to the sight of Peter Parker inhaling her meals and talking with his mouth full. Or she was just that smart. Anna smiled at me, and then her eyes narrowed almost imperceptibly, but spider-reflexes and instincts honed from years of razor sharp decision making made it too easy to see. She didn't believe me, and raised her eyebrow slightly. It was a simple, calculating gesture, but she had very cherubic features which made it just look innocent, if not cute.

"Gym, huh? Is that why you've been avoiding me and not answering my calls?" She asked casually, but there was an accusing tone to her voice, and it was one that I knew well.

Debra Whitman, Felicia Hardy, Mary-Jane Watson… More. My own Aunt, but not in the same context. Obviously, and unfortunately for Otto.

I was familiar with Anna's tone, tiringly so. I could see how this conversation was going and from the look on her face, Anna saw it too. I had a secret. One that I wasn't telling her, and that expression nine times out of ten preceded hurt, a package deal for whosoever dared care for the _amazing food-inhaling-man_.

Anna's expression softened, and I could see clear in her eyes that she did care for Peter Parker. Unfortunately, that didn't help me in the slightest and made the delicious meals that much harder to swallow. It made me feel nice at first, and then worse. I was Peter Parker, but I wasn't the man she knew.

It was with a guilty feeling that I realized it was how Ben and Kaine must have felt years before: imposters in their own body. We had all felt like we were imposters at some point.

 _Huh, must run in the family_ , was a bemusing thought.

Anna grabbed my hand and tried to smile, but was caught half between that half lidded look and a look of concern. As it was, she bit her lip, which did nothing to help me. "Slick, what's wrong?" She asked. "You know, when a gal comes over and cooks a full course meal for her _boyfriend_ , and he's just about naked, the guy is usually pretty excited and upfront at that point."

She rolled her shoulders and exhaled. "Forthright, grateful, horny. Go ahead, take your pick."

-Boyfriend. I hadn't heard that in a while. Jean and Silver made it a point call me… alright, to be honest, it was more of a guttural moan than anything, but Parker and Spider were common variants.

I smirked humorlessly at her. "Speaking from experience?"

She scoffed. "No, unfortunately. The only action a girl like _me_ gets comes from fetishists." I kicked myself for the comment. " _I_ have _standards,"_ she said proudly, "and my boyfriend, though really fucking _hot,"_ her eyes started to roam me once again, "is a damn _prude._ "

She scowled cutely at me, showing that any hard feelings of her height was long gone and buried by eye rolling experiences. I could honestly relate, though obviously on different matters. Her eyes glazed a bit and she swallowed. "But _lordy_ , does he have a nice body. _Obviously_ nothing to be worried about… which makes me wonder _why_ he's waited _so long."_

I blinked, because it was about at that time that I realized why she was looking at me. Anna Maria, extremely intelligent woman and girlfriend of Otto Octavius, was _horny_.

Not just. She was _panting_. Leave it to – notParker luck, my entire family told me to stopcalling it that – leave it to some weird twist that I just so happened to be a man of morals, who had just regained his body only to find a woman who so wanted to have sex with me unable to do so because that was the fucked up equivalent of misrepresentation.

I grit my teeth, my thoughts summed up into one appropriate, age old word. _Fuck_. And I wouldn't be able to do that much.

 _Two years…_

Anna backed up a bit, frowning worriedly. "Oh God…" She gripped my hand tightly. "Please don't be gay."

The food went down the wrong way and I choked a little. The misfortune was working overtime, apparently.

It could have been worse. She could have assumed I was and tried to set me up with someone. I was feeling pretty bemused at that point, if not downright jaded _,_ and quickly recovered. "I'm not gay, honest." I rolled my eyes to the ceiling. "I have a list of women you can call if you don't believe me."

She blinked once, twice, and grinned predatorily. "Ooh, _references_ ," she grinned, rubbing her hands. "I'd tell you not to show off, but I get the feeling I'd… _really like that_ if you did it more."

I hissed a bit, though not out of displeasure. She was flirting, and I hadn't gotten much experience with that in my life. That is, being flirted with. As Spider-Man, in my younger days (which made me feel exceptionally old seeing as I was only twenty-six), teenage bravado had me flirting a lot, but blow after blow from life had changed me into a different version of myself – I mellowed out in the worst way.

I still wasn't used to women flirting with me. Felicia was one thing – that I was used to, like a callous. This was new, and honestly, it felt good. Good enough to choke on my food, just a little.

Anna chuckled softly as I finished the bowl of soup and moved on to the second. My superhuman metabolism was coming back to bite me and my body in the ass but she didn't mind, watching me intently as I gratefully consumed the meal she made.

Meanwhile, I was stuck between my mind, which was full of morals: _Don't sleep with the woman who doesn't know you and is someone else's girlfriend._

My libido, which sounded suspiciously like Ben Reilly, Kaine, and thus, me: _Sleep with the woman who wants to jump your bones you jack ass, she's your girlfriend… technically_.

And my stomach, which I had thought only wanted to eat: _Have sex._

Okay, so its hunger had interests in things besides food.

 _Sex._

My mind was outmatched, but I was Spider-Man. I was used to this. It wasn't a democracy. _I_ called the shots here.

But it was quickly devolving into a _give me sex_ -acy. The ruling party, my mind, was failing to please its subjects and between my mind, my stomach, my libido, and myself, that was three quarters of a whole that felt wholly unsatisfied.

"You're _certainly_ not sick," she said, inspecting me with a languid, bedroom eyed gaze. "I've never seen you put so much away. You're eating like a man on death row." She licked her lips, slowly, and I watched her nibble one. God in heaven. "It's actually kind of… I mean I knew you liked my cooking, but damn."

I needed to change the topic, quick, and take a hard right into a situation that made sex impossible. My libido rebelled at the thought, but I was in control, _I_ called the shots, and I wasn't about to do to Anna Maria what Otto had tried to do with MJ.

I took a deep breath. Here we go, Parker. Time for the Hail Mary _. Mom, help me out here, would you?_ I asked.

For what good it did me. I had the sneaking suspicion my own mother did not have my goals in mind. Or my grandfather, for that matter. It was brief, but I could see her with a big foam finger and a little flag that said, _'Have fun!_ '

…Thanks, mom.

"It's common knowledge that I make things for Spider-Man, right?" I asked a little quickly, setting down the bowl.

"To anyone who bothers to look up from their damn phone nowadays, and has an interest in that sort of thing. Which isn't many," Anna replied blithely, rolling her eyes. "Is that what this is about? Are you… in danger? That why you've been… hitting the gym?"

I could see the gears turning in her head. It was obvious. Either I had had this body for a long, long time and she didn't know, or I had somehow developed a chemical that increased the amount of muscle built from exercising, and had done so in the short time she hadn't seen Peter Parker.

Because I was in danger of Spider-Man. _Oy vey._

I scoffed, and this surprised her. "Personally," I said, "I haven't been in danger in a long, long time." I wanted to distract her from the latter option, which was more suspicious. She was already worried, I didn't need to make her more worried. "I can handle myself."

She licked her lips again, and leaned out of her chair. She was small, of course, just south of five feet, but her body was… Plump. Curvy in all the right places and… _focus_ , Parker. Pay no attention to the gloriously bottom heavy woman all butt climbing on the table to your lap.

 _But_ , I meant _but_!

Anna Maria was indeed climbing over the table, her rear sticking up in the air. The type of behind that makes your mind wander. Put simply, it was a nice ass, my eyes were glued, and she noticed and grinned deviously. "I like that attitude."

My control was running thin. "Just… how much do you know about Peter Parker?"

She made a face at that, her nose scrunching up in confusion at my question, and eyes flicking in rapid calculation that showed only a fraction of her intellect. "I know you absolutely _shattered_ the NYC scholastic average when you were in high-school. You were _brilliant._ Like a young Richards or Stark, _"_ she beamed, and to my dismay it didn't seem to curtail her appetite, but simply exacerbated her _appetite._

Luckily that faded, and her expression softened. "And then… after Ben Parker was-"

(Un)Fortunately for me, thoughts of Ben's death no longer filled me with immeasurable guilt and sadness. I felt happiness, which was nice, good, _great_ , except that I'd been counting on the guilt to kick my libido in the balls. There was no guilt, and my plan fell through.

"Killed. It's alright, not like he'll drop dead now or anything," I said, smiling.

It proved to be a bit of a distraction anyway. My family was fine. They were _proud_. I was grateful, and relieved. Free.

But most importantly, I was still _horny_. "It's been a decade, I'm better," I said, and discreetly adjusted myself.

"Right," she said, looking dubiously at me. "Then you became…a _teacher_ for a while, right?" The look in her eye said that wasn't a bad thing. Anna Maria in a schoolgirl outfit tormented my thoughts. All the things you can do with a ruler… "At your old school."

I had her complete, astute, attention, and needless to say, her leaning out of her chair all but breast-down on the table, absently shaking her plump butt up in the air and… well, she had mine, and certainly not negatively either.

"Substitute teacher," I corrected weakly, shifting again. As I was, if I deigned to stand, the cat would be out of the bag, so to speak. "I couldn't keep the necessary hours and didn't have my degree for a while. I was a photographer before that."

Her eyes widened. "For the Daily Bugle, right! I remember now! You were the… only one to… ever get pictures of…" She trailed off, and her eyes glazed over again in thought.

That was good. Anna is a smart girl, and I'm a smart man. I knew she was connecting the dots, and the sooner she did the sooner she'd stop being so damn enticing. My spider-sense chimed slightly, as in affirmation, but I ignored it. It wasn't the ring of danger, which was odd, but I'd think on it later; though I wondered when I even took notice of danger having a specific ring.

The important thing was to get into a discussion about my being Spider-Man, which I wholeheartedly felt I could trust her with based upon the amount of care she had shown for Peter Parker. I only hoped she didn't look very attractive when she was angry, but as a side note, she does. She stomps her foot a lot and pouts.

Her mouth opened and shut and opened again. "But I _saw_ you!" she blurted, eyes wide. "When the city had been turned into spider people, I _saw_ you there, _next to-_ and-"

"It's a long story," I waved, smiling tightly. Not the only thing that was tight. I needed bigger boxers and was kicking myself for not wearing something baggier, but hadn't expected Anna to be… well, Anna. I'd seen her a handful of times before, and not like this. Those office clothes hid so much. Unfortunately. "What do you know about Miles Warren?" I asked blithely.

She blinked. Her eyes widened just a tad, before she got a cute, scrunched up expression. "Oh. Oh _damn_." She said, crossing her arms and lifting a hand up like a student in a classroom. "A clone _?"_

"Several," I said with a fond smile. "We're on good terms. Or… were."

"Were?"

"A good bunch of them died."

That took the piss out of the situation, but not in the way I had hoped. It was decidedly more somber, now, and I felt genuine guilt about that. As it was, my clones had been just as much Peter Parker as I was. Except…

"Don't worry, it's… complicated," I said, "Not many of them were… matured enough to have 'functioning' brains. Thoughts, personalities, memories. Many were shells." _Brainwashed shells_ , I thought inwardly. "Many weren't."

She processed this and ventured, "Genetic memory? Like Lamarckism or-"

" _Actual_ genetic memory, straight from yours truly." I huffed. "Yeah, I can still scarcely believe it. And of the ones that weren't brainwashed from the getgo, one was evil and one was insane, so."

"…Is that why you've been a bit of a _dick_ the last few months?" She tried, giving me an apprehensive look.

I raised my eyebrow. Anna was smarter than I thought and had already begun to connect the crumb-trail from what I had said so far. She wasn't on point, but she was so _close_. Connecting an old rogue of mine to odd behavior concerning _a_ Peter Parker? I would have clapped if the situation called for it, because she was almost at the bullseye.

"I mean, you've been kind of different. _Really_ different. A real grade-A shmuck, actually," she explained, giving me an apologetic look. There was nothing to apologize for as far as I was concerned, and motioned for her to continue. I was the interested one, now.

"I know it isn't unusual for your 'type' to get brainwashed or whatever, and what you said about clones-" She sighed, and thankfully got her ass out of the air and back in the chair. I watched it go a little forlornly, and if she noticed my eyes following she didn't show it. It was a _lucky fucking chair._

"Honestly, I'm just glad Spider-Man's back to normal." She said conversationally, as if that was all we had been talking about. "I preferred Spidey before that final bout with… Octavius. I'm a bit of a fan," She shrugged, getting out the name 'Octavius' like it was a pile of bug guts on her tongue. Or squid. "That man was a tyrant. Got what he deserved, as far as I'm concerned."

Once again I realized exactly what Otto had done. He hadn't only stolen my life, killed me, and burnt my bridges, but he had lied to so many.

I'm not innocent of that of course, but he was even less so. He betrayed Anna's trust, misled her. She thought he was Peter Parker, thought Parker was her boyfriend, and from the tone of her voice she _loathed_ Otto Octavius. Never in his wildest dreams would she have accepted him after what he'd done. If she ever knew…

Could I tell her? Did she deserve that? Yes, she _did._ She deserved the _truth_.

Great power, great responsibility. Not just concerning my abilities, or Spider-Man, but to everything. The greatest power anyone has is their own thoughts, what and how they think, and the choices they choose to make. I was _not_ Otto. I was not the type of person to steal someone else's life. I wasn't a liar.

Well, I was, I had to be, but you get my point. I was Peter Parker, and I had responsibilities to _myself_ for the first time in _too_ long, and chief of that was not allowing someone else to suffer because of my indecision.

Considering I had already insinuated I was Spider-Man, this would be easy. She took that well. I could tell her, right? Right.

It's really funny how when I got a concrete goal in mind, I was so much more keen of looking at her bend over in front of me and - _Priorities,_ Parker.

"You're close, _really close,"_ I corrected, quickly pushing my raging libido down, both physically and figuratively. Anna tilted her head in confusion.

"I've been… you know, since I was fifteen," I shrugged, ignoring her shocked expression. "I've kept it a secret from so many, and that was not a good decision. Nine times out of ten and a half. You don't deserve that, Anna. You don't deserve the strife it gets you. Believe me, ignorance isn't bliss. At the very least you can decide whether you want to hightail it outta town, now." I thought of MJ and forcibly stopped thinking of her. "You deserve it, and you've earned the right to know."

She smiled a small smile, more out of concern for the fact that I was now summarily distracted from my hidden and diminishing arousal due to a moment of self-inflicted seriousness, than actually finding the situation funny. I had trailed off and was frowning. This was, of course, in part because of the fact that I really wanted to see her butt back in the air but didn't want to ask.

"And you figured, "If the choices I've made in the past were wrong, then the opposite must be…" she trailed expectantly, a hesitant smirk appearing as she tried to ease the tension.

It worked. A laugh bubbled up in my throat. That had _not_ been my line of thinking, but it would save me a lot of trouble in the future. She looked at me teasingly. "Who do you think you are? _Costanza_?"

"No," I laughed, "It's just… You don't deserve to be kept in the dark, Anna. Not anymore. Not again. You're smart, too smart for that, and I'd much rather tell you myself than have you figure out by yourself." I paused. "That never ends up well."

"And you… want us to end up well?" She asked hesitantly, grabbing my hand. The significance of that was lost on me at the time.

I nodded resolutely. "Absolutely. You-"

And then she kissed me.

It had been a long week. Clearing the city, even with Miguel's help, wasn't an effortless task. Relieving and everything, but not easy. It would have gone easier if I had gotten over myself and spoke to my fellow Avengers, but I regressed into my lone wolf tendencies and was content to stay like that, if only for the moment.

Sleepless nights and building frustrations. I had come back a new man. I was Peter Parker again, and I got to spend what felt like wonderful years with family and friends I thought I would never see again. Guilt had faded away like smoke, and to add commendation to accomplishment, I had gone to _heaven_ ; cross that off the bucket list.

But coming back to life had its own share of troubles. From Spider-Man's resumed reputation as the worst thing to happen to New York, thanks to Jameson, to the lack of any meaningful support in my social life, Parker-wise.

To be honest, I needed both, because it was something I hadn't had in a while. MJ cornered the market on that, she was there for me. Now she wasn't, after everything, and Carlie? She hadn't even tried _._

Needless to say I was distressingly close to demolishing another building to relieve my stress. Where was Rhino when you needed him? I wanted to channel my inner Kaine and just beat _something_ senseless. Again. Gobby had helped, and recalling what happened to Otto soothed that somewhat. That didn't change the fact that I had come back to life in a body that had a year and a half long dryspell, and was extremely ready for action.

Years later, after I had assumed my role as _the_ CEO, I'd get my own song. _'Action is his reward';_ you've probably heard it.

Yeah. _Action_ is right _._

Anna's tongue wrestled with mine. She had made it out of her chair and into my lap in less than a second, I think, but my mind was on other things. Her tongue was everywhere in my mouth, on my neck, licking me, tasting me, peppering me with long, sweet kisses and desperate sucks that would leave hickeys for the rest of the night. She writhed in my lap, groaned, needy, and for the first time I realized that this was a woman who had waited until her boyfriend was ready, and she couldn't, she _wouldn't,_ wait anymore.

She leered at me like Peter Parker was the best man she had ever seen, and it felt _good._ I felt like any man should feel, done what any sane man would have done. I kissed her back. Hard. My libido shouted triumphantly, thumping against the table with an impact that would have hurt if not for my superhuman durability, and I ground her against me like my life depended on it as it popped from underneath the table and made a resounding _smack_ right into her soft, cushiony cheeks, my hands roaming, fingers groping, and our tongues twisting like dancers. I could taste her saliva and feel her breath, so steamy, and that look in her _eyes_ …

It was seconds later where she pulled away panting, but I was ready for more. I _wanted_ more. She had waited? _So had I._

Just- I _couldn't_ , though. She didn't know me, not really, and crossing that line and sleeping with her under these pretenses made me no better than Otto, no matter how much we both wanted it. It made me worse _,_ if only in a single regard. Even Otto hadn't crossed that line yet, though because of morals or genuine inability, I do not know. For my sake, I hope the fuck was never able to get a hard-on in my body.

 _God, that sounded so wrong_.

Now, the bad thing about being able to crush a titanium pipe like paper is that it extends to the rest of your body. I can leap several stories, juggle cars like nothing, and knock someone out with a tap of my baby finger, if not turn their skull to mush, just to name a few things. It goes everywhere. My legs, my arms, the force reflected when someone of lesser strength hits me. My pelvis. Sex. Super strength forced me to be tiringly, frustratingly gentle, because I was aware of just how much damage I could do.

However, I've been at this since I was _fifteen_ , and developed almost unsurpassed muscle control that had no doubt increased my strength past those who didn't show restraint, and that made holding back too easy. Being so hard up _didn't_ throw that out the window, however, my body had gained a mind of its own, and even when I stopped, Anna and I were still grinding against each other, rocking the table like a small earthquake as I squeezed and luxuriated in the pleasure of her cheeks beneath my fingers.

I had been waiting for so long? My body scoffed at that. It had been waiting longer.

Anna groaned into my neck, hot breath sending tingles up my spine and causing a pleasured lurch that had me thrusting helplessly against her pants, which she was now trying to get out of with one hand. I didn't hate those pants just as much as she did, they looked great on her, and they felt so _good_.

" _Slick,"_ I could feel everything, and she could too. Every single pulse of mine sent her jumping, giggling excitedly. She was hot, she was wet and not just her tongue on mine and… I could feel eyes on me.

I looked at the ceiling, suddenly worried, and inwardly flinched. Mary, _mom_ , you can stop looking now. Thanks for the help, _stop_ _looking._

"How about… in appreciation for you showing so much… mmph, _faith_ in me…" She took my tongue and sucked on it, and finally, somehow got her pants off.

My original goal returned with a vengeance and I was none too pleased. _Sonova_ … butt statistics, I mean _baseball statistics,_ nasty old ladies. Jameson in a dress, _something,_ but none of it was working.

"How about we go to your room and I show you my _appreciation_?" I very much wanted to see that.

Anna reached behind her and one by one her fingers wrapped around me and squeezed. By this point my boxers were no obstacle and I had a full tent in my pants that peeked past her cheeks, all nice and comfortable nestled in the warm space allotted to it. My self-control was almost out the window.

 _You're Spider-Man! Act like it!_ I recited, again and again. _You fought off mind controlling nanites! You've fought alien symbiotes! You managed to not wrangle JJJ's neck time and time again! A plump ass in your lap isn't enough to beat you._

It could wait, couldn't it? It could, but _I_ couldn't, _Anna_ couldn't. We didn't _want_ to. My nostrils flared as she languidly went up and down, gasping. "Holy _shit,_ Slick, where d'ya _hide_ it all?"

The pleasure went to my head, making my knees weak. My hands were still roaming her body and I cursed my fucking luck, with emphasis on fucking. I grit my teeth and said absently, "I cup. Occupational hazard."

Anna let out a weak, distracted laugh. Three guesses why. She muttered something, "I'll bet…" and was content to take my entirety and aim it at her, and just drop up and down on it, as if she was constantly missing her mark. I could tell she wasn't. I could tell she was enjoying herself and God I was too. I could feel the hardest nub flicking against me and-

I looked into her eyes. " _OttoOctaviusswappedmindswithmeandhadmedieinhisbodyandhasbeenlivingmylifeforayearnowandyouthinkI'mhimbutI'mmeandhepretendedtobemebutI'mbackandpleasestopbeforeIcan'tstopmyself."_

Anna Maria is a smart girl, but I have a history of rendering her speechless. She blinked. "What."

All of my thoughts, save my raging libido, went out the door. She stopped, and sat down, and I entered heaven. Her eyes widened in shock, and the sole thought in my mind was, well…

Cue _Joy to the World_ , Maestro.

" _OH, #$% !"_

* * *

Peter Parker's life has never been easy. Full of awkwardness and confrontation, and a healthy dose of melodrama in his college years. It's no surprise why being dead was a great relief to me. I had earned that. I had also earned another type of relief, the type that changed _Ball Status: Blue_ to _Ball Status: Fuckin' Ready._ I was begging for that relief, and relief of another kind at that moment.

Anna twitched and fell limp on me, forcing me to pick up the slack. I couldn't fit all the way inside her, but I didn't care in the slightest and neither did she, as her tongue lolled out of her mouth and she drooled stupidly on my shirt. She was so _tight_ , so wet, just my own piece of heaven and my fingers gripped her like a lifeline and I could feel electric pulses race from my body to hers and she started twitching and then….

 _Relief._

Sweet, blessed, relief. A year and a half of waiting relief. Her breath hitched, and I felt a rush of fluid hit me, utterly soaking me as she squeezed and writhed and moaned breathlessly, curling up on my chest, small hands making fists as she bit her lip to keep from crying out, and then pressed herself down on me as far as she would go. She couldn't hold back anymore and all I heard was " _Holy fucking SHIT!"_

Call it superhuman virility, which is a part of it, or a year and a half of _nada_ , or just having a very attractive, very sexy woman writhing in my lap. Whatever it was, it couldn't all fit inside and I felt her belly balloon slightly before it came rushing out, past me where I stuffed her full. Her hand went to her stomach with a stupid, pleased, crinkled smile on her face and she looked at me with half squint in one eye and another wide open as the last of it went in, and sprays of it splattered the underside of the now ruined table, and she settled herself into a languid twist on me, shivering all the while.

" _Fuck, Slick…"_

My thoughts exactly. My head hit the back of the chair, and Anna was still there, wringing more out, and bouncing, and sticking her tongue down my throat with a hunger I hadn't felt in… ever. And it felt fucking good.

 _Kiss my ass_ , Otto.

* * *

A long time later, I could tell because it was now pitch black outside and New York had settled into its waking hours, and one ruined pair of panties and destroyed pair of boxers later, as well as an utterly desecrated table and ruined dinner, my apartment was a mess.

I'm putting that lightly. When I say 'mess', I mean the meals Anna had made were tossed off the table when it was used as an impromptu bed. I mean the sink needed to be bleached and scrubbed before I would ever have anyone eat off of dishes that came from it again. I mean the refrigerator was now dented and stained and the floors were slippery and the carpet was wet and the couch was tossed in pieces across the room.

I mean Anna and I went at it like animals so much, the next day I'd get noise complaints.

Anna didn't have a change of clothes, so after dumping our articles in the washer, she was forced to walk around in one of my t-shirts, which was oversized on her. I felt dirty and wrong for what I had done, and those two things never felt so good in my life until that moment. I wanted a cigar.

As I slipped into a new pair of boxers, Anna had weakly pawed at me not to, but couldn't stand up straight enough or keep standing to stop me. She gained enough strength to toss every shirt I got away and across the room, leaving my bedroom a mess, before I finally decided to not put one on.

It was night out, and she was in my lap again. I had enough self-control not to fall back into it, but from the way she was absent-mindedly entertaining that idea I knew she wouldn't have minded. The air, thick as it was from sex, was different.

Hesitantly, Anna took my arms and wrapped them around her, but her confidence from before was gone now. She could barely stand, but there was another, more worrying reason for it, and as she looked at me expectantly, I knew the good times had come to a close.

Nodding to myself, I sighed. Here we go, Parker.

"Otto Octavius, using one of his inventions, killed me and stole my life. Somehow, he managed to transfer his brain into my body and mine into his." I stopped, looking at her to see if she was peering forward, horrified, like I expected her to. I was surprised to see I had her undivided, if expressionless, attention. "Last year when Spider-man killed Doctor Octopus, it was me who died, not him."

Her body trembled a little, but I wasn't sure if that was because of how weak she felt or shock, horror, and disgust. "Then… all this time I've-"

"The man you knew as Peter Parker was actually Otto Octavius," I finished for her, trying to keep my tone gentle. Unsurprisingly, the thought of a woman finding you disgusting through something that isn't your fault in the least? A bit of annoying. I was curt, but she hadn't noticed. My hands went a little slack.

I briefly wondered if this would come in stages. First the shock, and then the nausea. Whether or not her certain encroaching disgust was at myself or Otto, I wasn't sure, but hoped it was the latter. It would have been a grievous blow to my emerging self-confidence otherwise.

Her hands lightly pawed at my arms, but made no move to pick them up. It was an absent gesture and I could see her mind wasn't in it. Instead, she looked at me, curious, and her eyes wide.

Her mouth parted slowly as she said, "You know, I've seen… _you_ fight a lot of things over the years – when I said I was a bit of a fan, I meant it. I'm a big fan." I nodded along, and absently squeezed one of her cheeks. Big is right. She playfully swatted my hand away.

"Got a pair of custom made panties with your face on them, actually…" she trailed off, a weak laugh at the bottom of her throat."You… _him,_ " she scowled, "he saved me from being crushed by a bus full of people. It explains the first name basis."

She paused. "And you saved me from Skrulls, and giant spiders, a sentinel that crushed my old house... and from being blown sky high." She huffed. "Who's scoreboard do I put these under, Spider-Man, or _not_ -Spider-Man?"

I could tell she was trying to ease the tension, and gently tighten my arms around her. She relaxed underneath then, lightly tapping one of the veins that went down my forearm, leaning her head against my chest. "Otto… did care about you," I said lamely, loathe as I was to admit it.

She scoffed, looking disgusted. " _Obviously_ and _thankfully._ Enough to not leave me in the dark." she muttered. "That's what you meant, isn't it? 'You don't deserved to be lied to. Not again.'?" I nodded quietly. "At least now I know why he didn't… _you've_ been so… distant."

"I couldn't do that to you Anna." I said honestly. "Otto… he might not have crossed that line, but he still did something _awful,_ and I couldn't do that to you. I'm not the Peter Parker you-"

"Really, really enjoyed being with." She finished quietly. "And now kind of, maybe sort of care about. A lot." She stopped, and placed a little kiss on my cheek. I smiled.

But Anna's face was continued between anger and disbelief, with a healthy dose of disgust mixed in. She held on tighter and leaned back against me, working my tent between her cheeks before laying against me lazily. "Do you think he… didn't, you know, because he felt guilty?" She asked, looking downright disturbed at the possibility.

In my current state I couldn't help but give my opinion. Otto didn't deserve to be let off the hook, I thought indignantly, not after what he had done. "Anna, I'm here with a hard on in my new boxers-"

" _Another_ hard-on," she murmured, grinding against me. I certainly appreciated that, but kept trying to speak.

In the words of Kaine, "Peter, what the fuck."

" _Another_ hard-on in my new boxers-"

"A pretty _big one_ too," she interrupted, whistling.

"Thank you. And I just came back from the dead and-"

"Is that normal for you hero types?"

I blinked. She had interrupted me so much my annoyance faded away, and for the first time I looked at her, and that mischievous expression on her face, her lolling her head from side to side, rolling on my chest looking up at me with that cute, fake innocent expression of hers. For the first time I realized she wasn't disturbed, she was helping, teasing me, and began slightly bouncing her in my lap.

I snickered a little. "You'd be surprised. This… instance, is new to me though."

She blinked rapidly. "You mean you've died before?"

I ticked off my fingers once, twice, thrice. "Yeah…" I said tiredly. "The second time was a bit of a technicality."

"I'm all ears," she said expectantly.

"Oh? I have a beautiful woman's fantastic ass on me _and_ she wants to regale her with the tale of the time I transformed into a giant spider, died, and had my _corpse_ give _birth_ to myself," I mused, laughing as she froze and shook her head, still looking up at me. I kissed her on her forehead. "How wonderful."

"Nope, never mind. Nope the fuck outta that."

"Thought so. Can I continue?"

She smiled at me, leaning up to peck me on the chin. "Please. I like hearing you talk. _You_ , you."

That was good, I thought inwardly. She didn't feel betrayed, or horrified, or look that at least, but I had a good feeling. Every few seconds though I'd see her eyes bug out a little and her mouth _'Octavius…'_ before she regained her mental faculties. Besides that, it was going better than expected, so far. And all because I kept thinking Happy Thoughts tm which was kind of hard not to do when I was being dry humped. And then just humped.

"I'm here getting another hard-on in my boxers-"

"A _really big_ one, too," she interrupted again, grinning cheekily as she looked behind her to see said male anatomy wedged between her cheeks, only stopped by my boxers and pesky shirt.

"I'm not saying that."

"Then I will: " _A really big fucking di_ -"

" _Anyways_ ," I glared pointedly at her before propping my chin atop her head, "I just came back to life and I've just had the best sex I've had in the past two, three fucking years." She looked up at me, and once more another person was surprised at my language. She was exceptionally more beautiful than Doctor Strange, though. "I am _really_ not in the mood to discuss why the man who murdered me didn't have sex with you. Using _my_ body no less."

She shrugged, and made a point to take my ready for round two libido between her cheeks and smack it around. Great gal. "That's fair."

I nodded. Two could play that game. Innocently enough, my hands went between her legs. Years of honed reflexes and refined movements made my fingers dance across her skin, and I was grateful for my creative use of stick-em powers.

"Very. You want an honest answer? I think Otto Octavius was a coward and wouldn't know how to have sex if it meant being regarded as the smartest man alive." I paused. "And I'd like to think he was unable to get it up in my body."

Anna blinked at me, all movements ceasing. "That sounds wrong."

I looked at her gratefully. So it _wasn't_ just me. "I know, right?"

She started again, and her hand fished inside my boxers and pulled out her prize, which was extremely happy to be free. It slapped against her audibly, and she smacked her but a few times with it, before absconding underneath her shirt and showing it some place nice and soft. And wet. And hot. It was between her cheeks, and it felt damn good.

I rolled my fingers in a circle around her languidly, raising my eyebrow as she broke out into a fit of shivers and started to twitch. "… _Fuck,_ Slick." She swallowed. I stopped, looked at my hand, and then her, and she yanked it back between her legs.

"But you would, right?" She asked, still twitching. "I'm glad you said that, or else I would have called you an idiot and wondered if you lost some braincells when you _actually_ lost your mind. I mean, with that _extensive_ list of yours," she bit her lip, giving me a long side glance, "You must have a lot of experience."

I've been at this since I was fifteen. Plentyof experience. "It is the best teacher."

"Then how about you show me what you know."

There were a _lot_ of noise complaints.

* * *

 **(Deleted Scenes)**

 **Here, I'll be putting some bits that didn't make it. Whether it was because they were too short, didn't fit, or I liked the idea but didn't feel like expanding it, they'll be here. Essentially, an omake section.**

"They call you _amazing_ for a reason _,_ Spidey…" Anna said, though that's roughly translated from "Hrmprhlgrbllllph," as she kissed my chest.

My name is Peter Parker. I'm amazing for a reason.

Reason number one?

 _Fuck you, I'm Spider-Man._

 **That was fun. Honestly, I've written about forty thousand words in advance, but had to retool it a few times. I don't want this to be a super serious story at all.**


	3. Chapter 3: More AMM

**Fun fact: This story was originally going to be titled 'The Curse of Power', a RWBY crossover starring Peter, Jaune, and a prickly spider-deity. This was actually a lot less wordy because I wanted to hurry up and get to that part. Funny how things turn out. And by funny, I mean terrible.**

 **God, I want to write that story.**

 **Chapter also titled, 'The** _ **Anna 'Blew' Boogaloo.'**_

 **The M+ is there for a reason.**

* * *

A couple of weeks had passed. Life was still not as good as being dead but it was a lot better than I had thought it was going to be. A lot more enjoyable than I remembered, too, but I can attribute that to two things. One, I had been enjoying a rekindled sexual appetite. That made things so much more bearable.

Two, Miguel O'Hara, the Spider-Man of 2099 currently stuck in the past, was taking over as Spider-Man for me. I was on a break, and that saved me from the headaches of being the webslinger. For the most part. I couldn't just ignore crime when it happened, but I was taking a much more lax approach. Between Miguel and myself, the city was safe. Safer than it had been with the Superior Spider-Man, at any rate.

A good thing too, because while it was safe, it was distressingly apparent that Spider-Man was not liked anymore. Again.

It was back to the Stone Age in that regard – the city's perception of Spider-Man had plummeted, again, save for a near inaudible few that appreciated the webhead. It was nothing new to me. I had been at this for over ten years. The desire to be appreciated with some measure of consistency was long ago tossed out as an impossibility, though I enjoyed it when it happened.

Miguel however, was not used to this. He wasn't distressed by the public's perception of Spider-Man, who apparently had again changed his costume. Miguel just didn't _care_ , a trait we shared, but heavily reminded me of Kaine. He found it confusing and stupid, also as Kaine would, and hadn't hesitated to tell me so during our somewhat infrequent patrols.

* * *

 _"This city is shocking_ stupid _, Parker,"_ he had told me, heedless of possibly offending the city I grew up in. To be fair, he had also, technically, grown up there.

It was nothing I hadn't told myself in the past. Countless times of seeing how the people breathed and spat whatever the Daily Bugle told them had firmly created a route for that line of thought into my head. It wasn't as bad now that Jonah was Mayor though, but that was because so many had absorbed his tripe for so long it was firmly set in their minds.

 _"I know. Great, isn't it?_ " I said, with only a small amount of sarcasm. _"Bet my New York is better than your New York."_

He scoffed good-naturedly. _"It's not a competition."_

 _"But if it was, I'd totally be ahead. I'll take ball park dogs over your toaster-less future any day."_

Even behind the futuristic mask, I could see Miguel's face screw up into a look of disgust. " _You people ate_ dogs?!"

* * *

For once in a rare while the city was quiet. If he had done nothing else, the Superior Spider-Man left a reputation that preceded him, and one I couldn't find myself caring strongly in the negative about.

Spider-Man was now feared, and thanks to the certainty I got from 'upstairs', I didn't think it was a bad thing. Criminals were afraid of the man who had gone toe to toe with the Avengers over and again and had the city under his thumb and was particularly brutal, but it wasn't as if I was going to do the same. They were Otto's actions, not mine, and at the very least they didn't affect me in a negative way.

I realize however that 'post-parting' I _would_ have been shocked at the city seeing me in such a way. This would have been stupid. The city had already seen me as much worse in the past – whether it was being a murderer, a super-villain, in cahoots with a super-villain, or the mastermind of them, or burning down an orphanage – _thanks_ , Jonah.

Honestly, it was more of the same, bemusing to the extreme, and easy to not to let it bother me.

The Avengers were busy with… something, as usual, and too busy to look for Spider-Man in any meaningful way. Every once and a while one of them would patrol the city, and odd sight even to New Yorkers, or ring me up on my Avenger's card.

It hadn't missed me that the card hadn't been discontinued after all Otto had done while in my body. I figured half-jokingly that they were calling to notify me that it would be, though.

I could hear Steve's voice clearly. _"I'm disappointed in you, son."_ And then the line would go dead. The thought, as amusing as it was, wasn't funny. I would be stuck with something I didn't do for the thousandth time and it was all because the people I had trusted hadn't noticed that I had my life taken from me.

Now, how many times does a guy get to say _that?_

I _could_ have very well explained everything, gone to them and talked it out. It was a valid option. Just as valid was realizing that Ihad nothing to explain, then nursing a good amount of resentment before moving pass that, and continuing on as I had always done, and so I did. In hindsight I found I apologized for too much, put up with too much. The amount of distaste I felt realizing that definitely had a part in my decision.

The card could keep ringing, but I wasn't going to answer it any time soon. I was disappointed and just… _let down_. Negative things which I never let myself feel because Peter Parker didn't have the right to be angry or displeased with anyone.

Those negative feelings wouldn't help me, but every look I took at that card brought them up. So I left it somewhere in my dresser. I think… I left it beneath Anna's thong. Memory is fuzzy on that one. Either that, or in the medicine cabinet.

I… didn't have a medicine cabinet – it's hard for me to get sick – so it was… maybe on the bookshelf.

Anyways, it was now a rare sight for me to wake up alone, a fact I certainly enjoyed. Anna hadn't been back at her apartment in days and she was worried about it collecting dust, and so we parted the night before. It was in the night when she had come back, a distinct memory I recalled after waking up with her on top of me.

I smiled, despite the sun shining into my eyes. Due to years of waking up bright and early to fight bad guys for free, I had woken up just as early, just a little after sunbreak. With ease I slid her off of me and left the room quietly, starting to plan my day. Brush my teeth, have breakfast, go to work.

 _Go to work_. It was a refreshing sense of normalcy that I appreciated. The prospect of working at Parker Industries was no longer heart-stoppingly terrifying after help from Anna, and I was doing well in my position.

Today was an important day and uneasy feelings threatened to jelly my legs the moment I got out of bed. After going against things like Galactus and the Lizard, the reason for this made me feel silly, and I shoved those feelings aside and started to get ready.

While I'm a morning person out of necessity and habit, Anna was one naturally. It was little more than a minute after I had finished washing that she entered the bathroom, limping, a little dead on her feet but otherwise as awake as a morning person can be. She had an immeasurably satisfied smile that made me feel just a _tad_ bit proud of myself.

I looked amusedly at her as I exited, and she huffed as she gingerly climbed into the shower.

I went to the kitchen and sated my hunger, digging into the leftovers of the standard feast Anna made. It could hardly be called 'breakfast' and was really more of an early buffet, but nevertheless needed for me. Thanks to the spider that bit me, extremely fast metabolism and superhuman stamina had their price, and a big appetite was mine.

After that, I picked up the phone and called the woman who raised me. I hadn't spoken to her in a few days. Considering her stance on Spider-Man again, it was unsurprising.

* * *

"No, Aunt May, I'm doing fine."

I felt something strange as I spoke to May over the phone for the first time in more than a week. I had been busy, but past that I honestly hadn't wanted to. The sting of seeing her go back to beginnings and constantly deride and condemn Spider-Man had hurt.

It had _always_ hurt. Nothing Spider-Man ever did was good enough for Aunt May. I couldn't blame her, she didn't know – but… that wasn't really an _excuse,_ and in any case, I didn't have to like it. It was just another strike in the 'fuck you Otto' column, a chart that I was currently on the third page with.

I had lost any desire I would have had to eventually tell her that _I_ was Spider-Man again, as well. Call it petty or vindictive, but I had not one iota of wanting to see her reaction to that. She could tell the difference between the Chameleon and myself, knew that Spider-Man had been framed and imitated countless times over the years, but didn't consider it.

I couldn't have faith in that choice, couldn't trust it. I couldn't have faith in the woman I considered to be my own mother, and that was a pretty unpleasant feeling.

I huffed, fell into the soft, plush cushions of thecouch, _my_ couch and not Otto's. He'd had a penchant for leather and that type of furniture that should be seen, not touched, making the apartment very sterile. I switched it out for a more lived in look that suited me.

"Just woke up," I murmured, yawning in reply after she worriedly asked me what was wrong. Torn between absolute gratefulness at her care for me, and then annoyance that in one area everything was back to normal, I sighed again. "Just tired." It was truer than I wanted it to be.

"No, not because of Spider-Man. He isn't as bad as you think," I said half-heartedly. _He saved your life countless times, stopped your plane from crashing, I'd say he couldn't be that bad._

"He _tortured_ a man, dear," she replied patiently and judgmentally, as though I were a child. "I watched it happen."

The frown that twisted its way on my face wasn't my choice. But, out of everything Otto had done, I could not deny how much he cared for May Parker. Beforehand I would have condemned this, but now I can't in any stretch of honesty say I wouldn't have done the same.

I wouldn't have tortured that literal demon like Otto did, no. I would have been _far_ more _unrefined._ Proportionate strength of a spider is just an underestimation. I would have ground his bones into _dust_.

It made me realize that Kaine and I weren't so different. He was Peter Parker, after all, and every facet of his personality and his potential came from me. Only, I had held myself back before out of fear of what I'd become – it was a stupid and naïve fear, but hey, we're all scared of the dark at some point.

Otto had torn Gargan's jaw off with my bare hands for threatening May, in defense of her, and I would have done exactly the same thing. That is, not on purpose, but if his face ended up flying while he threatened the woman who was the only mother I had ever known, them's the breaks.

This would have disgusted me in the past, horrified me even. But it didn't now. The thought of doing that to them was practical, pragmatic, and deserved. They earned it. Family threatened - line crossed, kid gloves _off._

It did annoy me that Otto and I could agree on a few things, but what was I going to do, get annoyed that we both agreed that breathing was a necessity? No, there was a difference between allowed, understandable pettiness and stupidity, and I wouldn't fall prey to the latter.

Also, as the Superior Spider-Man's actions painted Spider-Man in a different light to the city's criminals, mollifying them, they also had taken the heat off of Peter Parker from the city scale. It was an unspoken rule, I noticed, to avoid Parker and his loved ones, or else you'd have to deal with Spider-Man.

The crime around my apartment and in the surrounding neighborhood was next to _nonexistent._ If nothing else, I could thank Otto for that.

I wouldn't, but it was a relief nonetheless. It seemed that for the moment, Peter Parker's loved ones wouldn't suffer because of Spider-Man, they'd be safe because of him. That was a welcome change of pace.

"He was a demon, May, a _literal demon."_ I said, my patience straining. "Fire, brimstone, damned and tortured souls and _everything_. And he had _you_."

May tsk'ed her tongue. She referred to Spider-Man with more than a little distaste, "That man's actions make him no better."

It took a surprising amount of self-control to not crush the phone in my hand like a potato chip.

 _-Really?_

I pulled it away slightly and took a deep, calming breath, carefully setting down the phone and not bringing it back for some seconds.

"Regardless," I said, "He saved your _life_. _Again,_ " I stressed to her. _"_ And I will always, _always_ be grateful for that."

There was a pregnant silence on the end, and I had hoped that she was deeply considering my words. Perhaps even giving Spider-Man credit where it was due, but I had no desire to hope for the impossible.

"A _demon's_ well-being is _not_ worth _your_ life, May."

She sighed. "I… I know. You're such a good soul, dear," she said in that soothing, patented voice that had comforted me over the years. It helped dissipate my annoyance, just a little. But anger is a tenacious thing; it will chomp at the bit to reign free. "There are few that deserve your kindness, too. I am _so_ proud of you."

"I kind of have to be," I muttered, wanting to distance myself away from that bubbling feeling of annoyance. Not at May. I'm only human, but Ben and May Parker didn't raise an ingrate. "I kind of have to be, being raised by a gal like you and a guy like Uncle Ben."

"You know that's the first time in a long time I've heard you talk about him and sound so happy," she said, a little surprised and more than a little pleased.

I smiled. "I'm trying to make myself proud too, Aunt May. Knowing you and Uncle Ben are proud of me helps a lot."

"And don't you forget it!" She chided, laughing in that feather light way that raised my spirits just as much as Ben's smile. "You should _never_ have any doubt about yourself. You've made me, and Ben, and your parents _so_ proud. Never question that, Peter. You deserve a little pride for once."

I felt stupid. Stupid and wrong. May, though she wasn't there for Spider-Man, she had always been there for _me._ As much as the former hurt, I wouldn't forget or deny the latter. She was one of the reasons I was still _alive_ … more or less. Dying a handful of times made death lose a good deal of its meaning, but Ben and May Parker were always a driving force in my will to _live_.

"You know… I know they would be." I said softly.

"Is that… _incident_ why I haven't seen you in so long?" She asked tentatively, perhaps even picking up on my feelings about it. I wouldn't have put it passed her. "Because you shouldn't worry about me, dear. I'm a big girl." She laughed, obviously not taking herself too seriously, but I could gleam the underlying tone of her voice due to a lifetime of experience with her.

"No, honestly. I've just been busy. I actually…" I paused, unsure as to whether I should tell her some fragment of truth. It seemed harmless, but I still considered it, circumspect.

My spider-sense chimed.

"I actually got into a bit of an… accident. Hit my head, went loopy for a few days."

"Oh, Peter why didn't you-"

"It's fine! It's fine," I said. "Anna's been taking care of me. I had a little bad amnesia and-"

"A _little_ and _bad_ are an oxymoron, dear," she interrupted in an all too familiar protective tone, and I winced on reflex.

"Anyways," I said, pursing my lips, "I had to relearn a lot of stuff to get me back up to speed. Didn't you hear? I'm a _CEO_ now. I've _got_ to know my stuff, don'tcha know."

May's voice brought forth the distinct memory of an eye-roll and an indulgent smile that I had seen too many times as a kid. Only this time I wasn't asking to stay up late so I could read a book on electrical wiring.

"Yes, I heard. _And_ my friends heard, _and_ Jay heard over and over again. I think he was very close to putting his head under water." She paused. "I am so, _so_ terribly sorry about what I did during our last dinner together. I feel _awful_ for offending you and Anna Maria."

Anna had told me distinctly what had happened. Otto, while he was unwilling (and I hoped to God _unable_ ) to consummate the relationship, had introduced Anna to May and Jay. Hurtful comments were traded and he had gone off the deep end more than was necessary.

This of course was where the glimpses I had seen of his memories had come into play. He had been positively giddy and possessed the symbiote, and was slowly going mad with the combined power and mentality of all of its previous hosts. It wasn't the symbiote that enhanced his aggression, it all came down to Otto's damn ego that went unchecked in his desire to be even more 'superior'.

He left in a rage. Anna scarcely cared about the comments, being so used to it, and had been more concerned with who she thought was Peter at the time, but with knowledge of who Otto actually was, she discarded any sympathy and empathy she had for him.

Truthfully it was hard for me to feel one way or the other about it. Having not been there and nearly unable to imagine May saying anything of the sort like that, my reaction was based around Anna's, which was magnanimous indifference and general serenity.

"Anna knows you meant well," I said, not wanting to bring up the fact that Anna had in fact gotten used to comments about her years ago. We were alike in that regard. Thick skin wasn't just a perk to being who we were, it was an occupational necessity.

May sighed heavily. "It was something that never should have been said in the first place. I know you're so forgiving, sweetie, but I was being close-minded and awful, and I cannot apologize _enough_ , and can't thank her enough for taking care of you when you needed it. She's a good woman, and the Lord knows you need one."

I smiled, taking my wins where I could. "Yeah, she is."

"I heard about Mary Jane, too. Her leaving. I… I'm sorry, Peter. Oh, there I go again."

I exhaled quietly, the mention of MJ bringing up things I would have rather ignored, and memories of her would have gotten me unpleasantly nostalgic.

I tried to laugh the sudden awful feeling off, but I wasn't amused in the slightest, and May could tell. "New York is a _nuthouse_ , May. I'm glad MJ is getting somewhere safe."

May knew not to press the issue. "If you ever need to talk… I know you two are close."

"Not as close as we used to be, apparently," I said, a little too coldly. "I'm sorry, it's just-"

May had a point. Anna had stayed by my side when she had every reason not to. I hadn't been the man she knew, but she was eager to know me, eager to pick me up at a dark place. Eager to care for me when she had no obligation to do so.

Not that MJ had one, but after everything she and I had been through she had the divinetiming of leaving when I needed my oldest, most trusted and stalwart friend the most, regardless of whether it was as a lover or a companion. After everything I told her, she still left.

And it tore me in three. Indignance, grudging understanding, and lastly, a longing for the life I had once known. The life I spent growing up alongside Mary-Jane Watson, who made a point to add the hyphen to her name.

The life of a time that no longer existed. The much cherished past of one deluded Peter Parker, come the year 2099. The CEO of Alchemax.

Thinking of my other CEO, the _other_ CEO, I suppose, was unpleasant. It was quickly washed away by thinking of Mary-Jane _._

In that timeline, Mary-Jane Watson, the firebrand of girl who lived across the street, was the reason why Spider-Man had the hyphen in _his_ name. Tomboyish little Mary-Jane Watson _hated_ being teased about a superficial thing like that, and that was Peter Parker's absolute favorite thing to do.

Hated it enough to chase after a little Parker kid all day long. Hated it enough to kiss Peter Parker while they watched the sunset and he corrected her tauntingly, _"It's, 'Spider_ hyphen _Man', thank you very much."_

I missed her sometimes, and there was nothing wrong with that, Now though I had enough sense to know that in particular. Sometimes I missed that entire life, but I had a fantastic reason not to miss it too much.

The CEO of Alchemax had done so much too much, and _look_ where it got him. To a corner with a God Complex signed for Peter Parker. _Oy_.

Aside from Miguel, I told _no one_ of this, and especially not May. She knew me well enough to understand, though. "I know, dear. I know." She said lovingly. "I really wish you would have called though. Had I known you were hurt-"

"You would have dropped everythingto see me," I said, chuckling to myself at the idea of it. I was a grown man, I couldn't have May chasing after me with a prepared lunch just any day. "I can't have that. You spent my entire life taking care of me, May. You deserve a break. Plus, it was extremely important that I get back on top of my game. I can't risk losing my position as CEO. You'd be so disappointed in me I don't think I could stand it."

"Pish posh," she scoffed. "Absolutely impossible. I'll never stop being proud of you."

"I know. I just couldn't risk failing the people who put their faith in me."

I paused. The people who put their faith in me… like I had put in the Avengers. So much for that show of trust. Dependence. Where had they been when I needed them?

I shook my head. All things considered, it turned out okay.

That was me being optimistic, an ideal that clashed with righteous indignance. They were both feelings for another time. "I can't let them down. I _have_ to be at my best."

May's tone was slightly reproachful and I could just about see her wagging her finger, "Just don't forget to take a break and enjoy life, Peter. You were always a hard-working, studious boy, but I _worry_ about you. You can't let the good things in life pass you by simply because of fear of failure. There are times when you need to put your own needs ahead of others."

"Sounding a little hypocritical there _Aunt May_ ," I said with a smile I couldn't restrain. May Parker telling _me_ it was alright to put my needs before others? Maybe I'd meet a jazz playing fish today, or Thanos as a ballerina. "You put my needs before yours my entire life, even when you couldn't, even when you shouldn't have."

She huffed. "That's because your needs for happiness _are_ my needs, young man." She was waggling her finger again, I just knew it.

Just then, Anna came from the hallway and steam rushed out. She had just exited the bathroom and her hair was wet and dripping, and the towel wrapped around her hid nothing. Of course it couldn't, it was draped around her neck. She saw me on the phone and smiled beatifically, absolutely careless that she was walking around naked.

My smile softened. Aunt May had no idea how true her words were.

Anna's body had me trail off for a few seconds. The steam had condensed and turned into droplets that ran lazily down the curves of her body. In the weeks that followed my confession to her I had become patently familiar with every unique feature; from the slight bump of her wide, fertile hips to the smooth curves of her thighs, and the beauty mark on her inner thigh. From the soft, perky mounds of her breasts to the voluminous rise of her cheeks and the angelically smooth place between her legs, my eyes heeded gravity down to the dripping wet, blushing skin of her legs and dainty feet as she walked down the hall.

All of which I got a prime view of as she turned with a bounce and a smirk and a ' _Look at_ _you looking at me'_ look, and marched into the kitchen, every jiggling curve of her working for my benefit. She ruffled her short black hair a bit to dry it, but that was all, and the towel stayed where it was, painting a pleasantly familiar picture that I had seen every night, and every day, in my bedroom so far.

Realizing I was staring, I didn't stop, wouldn't, but I couldn't leave May wondering and worrying, such was her nature concerning me. I scrounged what brain cells that weren't preoccupied with coming up with ways to have fun with Anna.

"I'm starting to learn that myself, Aunt May," I said without taking my eyes off of the naked woman in my kitchen. "I _do_ deserve good things, don't I?"

Anna, who had been mid-way between taking out a carton of apple juice and closing the fridge, raised her eyebrow at me curiously. I nodded and she shut it with a bop of her hips, making sure to smirk in my direction. She sipped the juice cutely, calling more memories I would have rather not have recalled while on the phone with a woman who was a mother to me, and Anna peered over the glass that was nearly too big for her hands.

Watching her swallow, she set the glass down and gestured silently at me, a curious look in her eye. Thinking I recognized the look, I waved noncommittally.

I did notrecognize that look, but I would remember it - the truest meaning of tongue-in-cheek _._ Or what her tongue in her cheek actually meant.

Anna walked toward me, dripping, and I confusedly looked from her to the kitchen as if that would clue me in. On the other end of the line, May said, "There was never any doubt that you do, Peter. It shocks me to know that it took you so long to realize that. You're just as stubborn as Ben sometimes," she scoffed. I laughed, but my attention was understandably divided.

There was a table in front of the couch. I had taken to prop my feet up on top of it as it was rarely ever home to more than pamphlets and the like. Anna sat on her legs, kneeling, before the table. With her curves on display my reply was ousted from my mind, and she looked at me and bit her lip. Then, slowly, she snaked her way beneath the table, towel still on her head.

"Uh, ah- well you know what they say, May: 'The most obvious things are the easiest to miss'", it was something to that effect, I think, but to be quite honest my brain had short-circuited about three times in the space of ten seconds. The view of Anna's rear obtusely trying to get underneath a table that wouldn't quite allow it was impossible to miss and right in front of me. Then she cupped my crotch, ran her hand along it appreciatively, and it was an obvious and distinct feeling impossible to not feel.

Then she buried her face between my legs.

As I was wearing nothing but sweatpants, the sensation was immediate. I jumped, hissing, and could hear her laughing impishly underneath the table.

"Peter, are you okay?"

"Yeah, I," I paused, quickly thinking of an excuse, "Just getting ready for work," I said, to which Anna looked up at me from her cover and raised her eyebrow as if to say 'Oh _really?',_ and then grinned like she didn't dislike the idea. "Got… orange juice in a cut on my face."

May's audible eye-roll was lost on me. Anna took to breathing deeply after nudging my legs out of the way, and I barely had enough sense to hiss at her to stop, albeit halfheartedly. I saw the look on her face, messy black hair peeking from beneath the towel, and that smile and… Of course she wouldn't have listened anyway. I doubt I could have come up with a good argument as to why I didn't want her on her knees between my legs.

I, we had found out, myself with moderate surprise bordering on indifference, and Anna with glee, was extremely libidinous. Meaning, I liked sex. Not necessarily a nymphomaniac, but if the prospect was there, so was I. It really wasn't helped that in my life thus far my sex life was a well running dry.

The thing was, my stamina far stretched passed her own, so I had no doubt Anna was doing this for my benefit… and possibly hers. She wouldn't have put up with limping that much if my assumption wasn't true. Anna Maria Marconi is a smart girl. Smart enough to realize that expelling your frustrations into the gratuitous ether of sex is extremely good for you. _I_ hadn't known that and if I _had,_ I had forgotten about it, because again, I had more or less a two year dry streak that ran the length of New York State.

I exaggerate, but one or two fun times hadn't made my sack less blue.

Suffice to say, my days beyond work at Parker Industries had passed pleasantly and easily as I looked forward to going home. I had little doubt it was a Pavlov effect. Anna had indeed done her best to bring me up to speed with what I needed to know of the company, and in return… I made her scream. The more she taught me, the more noise complaints I'd get. Of course she would have taught me regardless, and I was always a quick learner, but it was my way of showing thanks.

Jokes aside, it was a great help to me. She was. Realizing how deep into my problems I could sink while alone against the world, I was immensely grateful to Anna for what she had done, and immensely grateful that I had her. And also, immensely indifferent to the amount of satisfaction I got fucking Otto's girlfriend until the walls rattled with her voice.

All in all, I was kept pleasantly distracted from the annoyances of coming back from the dead and finding my life in tatters because a murderous jackass named Octavius thought he didn't deserve to die.

'Pleasant' is a weak word. Let's say _fantastic._

Regardless, one would think being on the phone with a relative would be reason enough to put your desires aside for the moment. One would be wrong.

My voice caught in my throat and I grumbled to myself playfully, and relaxed into the couch. It wasn't the first time _this_ particular scenario had happened in the last week, so I was used to it. The first time it occurred while _on the phone_ with someone, but I could get used to that too. I've fought things like Venom - this was nothing.

Anna nuzzled into me like a pillow, and then reached into my pants. The table was upended by the rise of her ass but that didn't stop her. It rocked and made a loud enough noise to catch May's attention, to my eternal panic.

"Do be careful, Peter." May chided, amused. "Or working hard won't be all you have to worry about. You sound as if you're falling all over the place."

With the acuity gained from countless near death experiences, I forced myself to relax. "That was the door. It… should be Anna. We're going in to work together," I said calmly, and gave said woman a pointed glare. In between my legs, she assumed the innocence of an angel.

Right before she licked my crotch, sweatpants and all.

"I was so busy talking with you, I hadn't noticed her knocking." I thought I had it under control. May would realize I was busy, and we'd talk later. No such luck.

My spider-sense chimed in the negative. It was hardly the time to wonder and roll my eyes at the experience, but I was familiar enough with the new type of ping by now to heed it well. It had been happening a lot, recently.

"Oh, wonderful! Would you mind if I spoke with her, to apologize?"

I closed my eyes and breathed deeply. Anna watched me playfully, expectantly, content with cupping my sack with her hand and rolling it around gently, the look on her face saying _'Well?_ ' as she gave me a little lick.

 _Trust your instincts, Parker_. In the past, instincts, I thought, were bad. Now, my instincts were telling me to trust my spider-sense. I handed the phone to Anna.

Then, she bounced and her too-large-to-fit-comfortably-beneath-the-table ass made it rock – a piss-poor imitation of a door opening. _Loudly_.

Instincts bad. _Anna Maria Marconi_ was bad, and I wouldn't change that for the world.

"Mrs. Jameson?" Anna said, looking up at me with wide, innocent eyes and a smile that was too savvy for it to match with the rest of her expression.

She started speaking animatedly with the woman, gesticulating and laughing as though she wasn't face first in my crotch, using said gestures to coax me out of my pants or watch me break them without my hands, a la super-strength. Whichever came first.

"Oh, it's good to speak with you too! No, its fine, really, I understand that you had our best interests in mind. Peter deserves someone who cares about him so deeply."

Fishing me out of the confines of my pants came first it turned out. She worked to pull the sweatpants down with both hands, holding the phone between her cheek and shoulder. "Mmf, yes, he _is_ a good man, and he does deserve good things," she said, looking meaningfully at me. Then she was in her own world, and I wondered if that 'world' entailed pulling my meaty appendage from my boxers while she talked to the woman that raised me, or talking to the woman that raised me while she pulled me out of my boxers.

"You two were just talking about that? Small world," and she squeezed gently, her fingers digging in to what remained of my not long for this world softness. They barely interlocked when it was flaccid and only got further apart. She smacked her face with it, giving me a half-lidded, casual look with a small kiss, and then grinned lopsidedly at me. "Yes, he does need to sit back and enjoy life once in a while. He works too _hard_ and _deserves_ a break."

Anna's feet stuck pass the table pretty conspicuously, but it wasn't like May would have seen them. I did though, from the reflection in the TV, and could see her cheeks rock side to side along with the table as she started to wiggle, jiggle, shake, and jiggle some more.

It was without a doubt the best show on television, and I thought to myself, "What sad version of Peter Parker needed _The Walking Dead_? Obviously one without Anna Maria in his life."

I leaned back slightly, still not altogether comfortable with the attention while my oblivious Aunt was on the phone with Anna, but quickly coming to terms with it as I enjoyed it.

Anna placed an appreciative kiss on my leg. "I just hope I'm good enough for him," she said sincerely, looking me right in the eyes. "God knows he deserves it. He's a bit of a hero to me, you know?"

I glared at her witheringly, but I trusted her and her judgment. As if it was needed, and it wasn't, my spider-sense chimed at that. In return, Anna did an impressive imitation of licking a popsicle, and I don't know what May said after that, but obviously kept talking while Anna pulled me into her mouth with a hum. I tossed my head back and let my worries melt away.

Too soon, after her cheeks were stuffed and she made an off-handed comment about having a quick nibble on a kielbasa sausage for breakfast, she pulled back, said goodbye, and handed the phone back to me.

"It's about time for our morning jog," I distantly heard May say, referring to her and Jay's exercise routine. Little did they know Anna would be getting one of her own, "I'm not sure when you're schedule is, but do take care not to be late. Hardly fitting of a CEO," she said wryly, and there was that audible finger wag again. "I love you. Do be safe."

I laughed weakly, more at the preposterous timing of the conversation than anything. "I love you too," I replied, distracted, and hung up.

Anna gagged ever so slightly before pulling back and showing her own affection. In fact she was showering me with it. Streams of saliva cascaded as she started kissing the tip, wetly sliding down to the base at a glacial pace before she licked them up hungrily and showed off a sticky and eager mouth.

I set the phone and let her work. What a good way to start the morning. If there's one thing the women in my life are right about, it's that I _do_ deserve good things.

Sadly, as it usually does, life comes a knocking. Anna pulled away for a second and gave me a look that contrasted with her appearance. That is to say, looking at me with her lips pressed into a fine pout as if she was stuck in thought, and then decidedly, wetly, and stickily smacking her cheek with the girthy shaft as if it were something other than what it was and she wasn't holding it in her hands.

She looked up at me and blinked. "You really _should_ get ready, Slick. We have the meeting with the board of directors today. Probably best to be ready," she said, knowing that the morning commute wasn't exactly a problem for me.

Worry rising briefly again, I stowed what I couldn't dismiss, away. Giving in to it wouldn't help, but giving into the feeling of her breath on me would. I nodded, relaxed, and watched fascinatedly as Anna resumed her attempt to not only ignore her gag reflex, but to beat her record.

* * *

 **So I wrote that. Writing lemon powder in the first person is an exercise. I might tone it down.**


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4  
**

 **New, much shorter, chapter.**

 **If I had to give this a timeframe, which I hate to do since the logistics give me a headache and make me panic with Author's Ineptitude™, then I'd put this around the time of Spider-Man 2099 #1.**

* * *

 _Bank robbery._

 _-Don'tCallMeMikey99._

It is in the apparently timeless tradition of Spider-Men (and women, though this seems to be largely limited to the unfortunate girl versions of me _)_ that when there is personal business to attend to, responsibility will rear its head and bark. Loudly.

Being a good ten years behind in a certain effort, I was making up for it to feel good about myself and it was showing. I made strides in my countless repetitions of telling myself New York had a veritable litany of heroes to take care of it, and that having died in the line of duty – again – I deserved to take a week off, seemed to be helping. So did the sex.

It wasn't the first time I had bit the bullet, of course, but it was the first time I made it as far as I had. First was in limbo with those party animals Death her/it/himself, and Thanos, the killophile. The second happened quickly enough that the next thing I knew I was popping out of my own arachno-sapien stomach _,_ alive and better than ever.

The third was stuck in a jungle with… the Other, an entity with a flair for the cryptic and dramatic. A real charmer.

It _ate_ me.

Long story short, I realized that I had a lot of days to sit back and relax. Days which I had never taken advantage of and, if gained by death in the line of duty, had to be multiplied by four. They were a lot more seductive if I could spend my all of my time in my bedroom, also making up for lost time. Superhuman stamina goes a long way.

Unfortunately I didn't get paid for what I did, so no paid leave. I had to work. Still, those days off with Anna were pretty swell. That morning in particular I walked out of my apartment with a pip in my step and wide awake, and an even wider smile.

Anna however skipped breakfast and walked gingerly, being more than a little full. The morning commute was easy for me, but not so easy for her. We could have driven there in her car, but the prospect of getting to work after one of my ownemployees (a fact that was still surprising to me), was not a seductive one.

Anna fortunately managed to keep her 'breakfast' down, so I didn't want to have to explain to anyone why my suit had undigested white spew on it. She was more than a little queasy afterward, but the dirtiest look she shot me was, 'Are you happy?' I was.

Miguel once told me: " _We jump around fighting bad guys for free, we have to be insane,"_ and he was right. I am a little insane. My reward for this insanity was action, just not of the PG variety.

Leaving the city in my fellow Spider-Man's hands was the responsible thing to do. That is, responsible for me. He was a good Spider-Man, though maybe it's because he comes from 2099 where you need to be a good anything in order to survive.

Or maybe it has something to do with the fact that he didn't joke very much, or because his costume is really confusing at first glance. I imagine questions like, "You don't look like Spider-Man though?" Get really old. It's probably why he had sarcasm down to a science.

I trusted that that if I counted on him, he wouldn't let me down. That was something that I can't say I gave many.

I couldn't afford to divide my attentions between the two sides of my life and with Mig's help, I didn't need to. The choice was a no brainer; it wasn't just responsible, it was smart, something I needed to be - stupid CEOs don't have very good careers. They either end up under the thumb of someone else, or a figurehead. Or dead.

It was with a fire in my eye and roaring in my stomach that I refused to be any one of those. I'd been through too much to end up like that. If there was one thing I was through with, it was rolling over.

I knew I couldn't be Spider-Man forever. Though my powers, as it turned out, would keep me in my physical prime for… a _long_ while, a fact I attributed to my healing factor, there would come a time when I finally tired of it, no longer shackled by a twisted sense of responsibility, or simply died again. Whichever one came first, or both in a freak accident of happenstance.

I wasn't thinking about jumping in front of a bullet anytime soon, but looking back at my life, I lost my powers a _lot_. And with the bullet thing came memories of watching an aged Peter Parker get shot in the back in the middle of a rainy cemetery that still had me pretty wary.

I wouldn't have thought this way before dying. I suppose Otto had done me a favor. Thing is, I'm so stubborn Death herself can't stop me. …For long, anyways. Don't tell her that, though. Him, it, whatever. She's a sweetheart, _entropy of the Earth_ , I love her to- anyway, as it turned out, I have the singular ability to get under 'her' skin, or cloak, or bone marrow, just enough to have her chase me down on principle. That one target she can't hit, and when she does, it is foul play and rescinded. It's the spider-sense. It's called being Amazing.

My attitude was now a far cry from what it had been in my younger days. I still knew that eventually Spider-Man would cease to be, but thought he'd fall in a blaze of glory. Or dead in an alley because "Kid, you're in over your head."

But until then I'd keep going, because even on his worst day, even back then, Peter Parker was a tenacious jackass, because he was supremely hard to squash.

Spider-Man was vilified, hated, and I thought he wouldn't be remembered. When you have people like Captain America and Thor, bombastic, heroic, larger than life figures like Tony Stark and beloved celebrities like Dazzler, who needs a scrawny kid from Queens who lacks the sense to layer up in the winter?

And without enough sense to supe up his costume every couple of years? By the time I was twenty-two I was still running around in a full-body onesie. I could have been using my web-fluid as short term armor for _years._

My balls were the size of twenty pound weights and more brass than a trombone for doing that kind of crap. Ben was right to chase me around with a couch.

But I was wrong. I _have_ inspired others and there is a long line of spider-people that stretch the centuries, spanning millennia. Because of me. That's pretty fantastic.

I had met a little less than five years into my career, the Spider-Men of 2099 and 2211. If there was ever an accolade to be had, that was it. To a younger me, it was momentarily uplifting, but my nasty habit of not letting myself stay happy had attracted a lot of bad things.

Still, _Achievement Unlocked: You're going to be Kind of a Big Deal._

I didn't feel 'guilty' anymore and with a sound mind, that was a fifty ton weight off my shoulders. Nothing I hadn't lifted before, but it was a heck of a relief not to have to.

Still, part of me, an old, faint, _fading_ part of me thought I was Spider-Man, and a license for an extended vacation was not one for permanent absence. I had a _duty_ to-

But no, I really didn't. The paramedics, law enforcement, the firefighters, they had a duty. An obligation. A, and I laughed to myself at this, a _paycheck_. Respect. I had a decade of _guilting_ myself into it and the only duty I had was to my company, to my career, and to myself. But with those other things gone, what reason did I have to be Spider-Man anymore, what _drive?_

The answer really is rather simple. I enjoy helping people. Making sure they got home to their families. Making sure that the brothers and sisters, aunts, uncles, dads and moms out there got to see their loved ones again. I enjoyed helping because I _could_. Because if I did, someone might be saved.

That was something I hadn't realized when I was holding myself accountable for a handful of deaths. With the guilt gone, I found that being good… felt _good_. As selfish as it sounds, I'd be good because I deserved good. But I'd also be smart.

 _"You did good, kid. So_ proud _of you,"_ was something Uncle Ben had said to me whenever I achieved something. It didn't matter if I got an A+ on a test or just didn't fall in with the wrong crowd, or had managed to fix the broken TV and the flickering lights, or even when I was bullied a lot, snapped and chased after my bullies for troubling May.

Those words never lost their weight, never lost their meaning, and always made me feel like the luckiest kid on earth, but I had forgotten them. I wouldn't do that again. Instead of 'power and responsibility', it'd be what Ben always told me.

But I wouldn't stop being Spider-Man. That's impossible. I'm the- well, not the one, or the only, not anymore. But I _am_ the original, the OG, the amazing… me. And it is just too fun to piss people off.

Sneaking up behind a gang of thugs and webbing their feet to the ground, webbing their hands to each other's crotches? Interrupting supervillains mid-monologue! Getting pigeons to crap on crooked cops! Being that jack-in-the-box to heroes with sticks up their asses and just being in Jonah's line of sight.

I couldn't give that up. If nothing else I would be annoying the hell out of Jonah and any relative that took after him for decades. That's what he earned.

So, as I had told May, a break was necessary. I had a lotto catch up on and more accurately, a lotto learn. If I had been forced to balance my duties as the CEO of Parker Industries and as Spider-Man, something that hadn't had any satisfactory outcome when I worked at Horizon, I know for a fact how it would have gone.

With a half of a lifetime in balancing my webslinging with my jobs, my relationships, I knew Spider-Man always came out on top. Anna, as loyal and dedicated as she is, would have been the overworked secretary. Getting none of the credit and all of the headaches, covering for me and doing her best to run the company on her own.

I couldn't have that, couldn't and wouldn't be incompetent like that. I couldn't leave her to that. She was a part of my life, and _my_ responsibility to my life was a responsibility to her, to my company, and to my people.

I wouldn't let them down, but I once thought that Parker and Spider-Man couldn't be in two places at once. Even after the entire clone thing, the idea was farfetched because my own clones seemed to have had the sense to change their names and subsequently avoid the clusterfuck of bad luck that Peter Parker attracted to himself. Even Parker himself didn't want to help… himself.

Considering how much of a jackass I was to them, I don't blame them. I was kind of a Dick, but fortunately for them, they didn't attract the same luck as strongly. Ben never let it get him down and Kaine… well, Kaine just didn't care.

Again though, I was wrong. Kaine had been there for me, Ben had, Miguel had, and for the first time in a while Peter Parker could count on Parker, and on Spider-Man, be it the sensational, reluctant, or futuristic variety.

For Miguel, he had taken his duties as Spider-Man seriously. He felt no small amount of guilt for not being able to stop my death, or even find out in time. It seemed like guilt and responsibility were a prerequisite for just about any Spider-person. The man who had been willing to _rewrite_ the entire timeline to save me, even if it meant taking on an entire corporation _led_ by me, was guilty.

Granted, doing all of that was also to preserve his own home, but it is still a pretty tall order.

Miguel is a great friend. He's also stubborn, which is also a standard Spider-Person trait and a hard one to squash. He was checking the boxes next to all of the most sought after Spider-Man traits, something that looked very good on his superhero resume. I didn't doubt that his own sense of guilt, or responsibility, was hitting him pretty hard. One of those two things always gets us.

He was where I had once been, making me realize that history really does repeat itself. Even if you're from the future and stuck in the past, it doesn't care. His life was about as empty as mine used to be. Crappy apartment? Check. Crappy job working for an asshole boss? Check.

He had a small triangle of friends. That is, me, Lyla, his AI companion, and himself. In between his duties as Mike O'Mara, a conspicuous name if I've ever heard one, a scientist working at Alchemax, and his time as the latest Spider-Man on the scene, I doubt he got much chance to sit down and breathe.

Knowing what resides in his apartment, I think it was for the best. The brick walls were growing some sort of green _something,_ and it wasn't moss.

But Miguel wasn't doing it for the very same reason I did, and should have dedicated myself years ago rather than guilt. Miguel was doing it because that's who _Spider-Man_ was. That's the man history would remember _me_ as. That's the man who inspired him.

Even his reluctance to admit that couldn't stop that tidbit from making my day. He wasn't a man of many words and had a distaste for making long, heartfelt speeches just as much as Kaine and myself. He gave his own truncated version of what I am positive was a spirit rousing speech, however.

" _I've got a legacy to uphold and… yeah. All that. Can we go save people, now?"_ We really needed to work on the noble proclamations, but he was coming along. I even got him to start quipping! Finally.

Being Spider-Man brought with it bad luck, though it became steadily apparent to me that that could be changed. Not ignored, but weathered, like Ben Reilly had done. Keep your head up, rainbows after rain and all that good stuff.

Horrid luck, or anything that was reserved for those unlucky schmucks that look like me, included but was not limited to death - something I, my brothers, and the alternate universe versions of me can all attest to.

I hoped Miguel didn't have to deal with that. His luck was a bit slapstick, so he was better off. His luck was of the kind that got him stuck in a bank to deposit a check so he could have enough money to outfit his apartment with more than a lawn chair and ketchup in the refrigerator… only to have the bank get held up.

You can't make that stuff up.

I was close to suiting up and going to help – old habits die hard, and Miguel had been there for me. I'd do the same.

But, I had faith I had in my fellow Spider-Man. He could handle it, the city was in good hands, and I had my own responsibi- _duties_ to deal with. Ones I could not afford to sweep to the side, as I had so often done in the past.

It was time to go to work, and I stepped through the doors of the building. _My_ building.

* * *

 **I enjoy getting Peter out of that mire of non-growth he's been in for so long. If nothing else, it makes me feel better, and I sincerely hope some people enjoy reading it.**

 **The more he does distance himself from that, the more similar he is to a certain swear-jar frequenting (** _ **I'm not**_ **)Spider-Man(!)?**


	5. Chapter 5: SJ

**Chapter 5  
**

* * *

As much as I can attribute my success to myself, a good percentage belongs to my friends, the spider-bite, and a group I like to call the 'Article Trilogy': The Great Weaver, The Other, and the Gatekeeper. Because of them I got through many things.

But 'Parker Industries'...

The truth is that I had doubted Parker Industries, 'Otto Industries' as it were, and for good reason, the most pressing being that it was built on a muddy foundation.

I can say a lot about Otto; I can write a book that would make the most prophetic writers shout in rage and incredulity about him and damn his name, and I can turn that into a best seller. That would only grant him his last wish, 'to be remembered'. I wanted him to fade away.

I give credit where it's due, though, and admit that if there was one thing he had learned to do, it was to surround himself with competent, credible people. Finally.

It just so happens that competent people couldn't stand him.

From the droning scientists in the labs to the Spiderling mini-army he had amassed in a stereotypical supervillain way, Otto may have learned from his days of leading the Sinister Six, but he was _still_ a pretty shit boss.

Unless it suited him and his ego, Otto possessed zero loyalty or compassion, which was why he was capable of torturing and experimenting on his former 'allies', mind controlling them, and using them like puppets.

Granted, I felt hard pressed to feel some amount of pity for them after everything they'd done. Call it a clear-eyed pragmatism – like karma calling to collect, really – but it said a lot about him when enough had already been told. I suppose it says a lot about me, too.

I didn't have faith in what the company was at the time because it was created by a man with a less than ideal history. Much like I wouldn't trust Norman, sorry, Mason Banks, to raise a child, or how I would not trust Eddie Brock to any overt degree; a side effect of coming back from the dead was that my perceptions were… more cut and dry. I wasn't going to be doling out my trust as I had in the past. It was, again, pragmatism.

Similarly, I couldn't and wouldn't trust Otto's endeavors. He was, admittedly, brilliant. There was no stubborn pride to tell me otherwise. I was absorbing his knowledge through his notes and other things he left behind with a distant and clinical attitude that would bring him no satisfaction were he alive. I was taking what was his. As petty as that was it felt good, and fuck, did I deserve that.

Otto's history, mostly due to his arrogance and tenure as a career supervillain and megalomaniac, was doused in failure. While he never set himself up to fall explicitly, his pride always came before the rush of the ground to meet him, as pride tends to do. His pride was always on, even in death.

So when I say that Parker Industries was built on the unstable foundation of a man's ego and desire to reassume his former glory in the life and body of someone else, _me_ , I mean that it is something that I look at with a circumspect view.

The company was young, new, untested. Otto had it in his head he could get into the big waters and make a splash with his genius alone, never mind the fact that this deep blue was the haunting grounds of much, _much_ bigger fish. Stark, Roxxon, Alchemax, just to name a few.

That was _always_ Otto's problem. He always wanted to prove he was _better_ than someone else, suffering from a lifelong inferiority complex that he'd turn into an intellectual pissing match. Otto wanted to prove that through his genius alone it could be done, and Parker Industries would be held up to the level of titans.

It was no different than what he tried to do with me, to Spider-Man. He wanted to be 'superior' to every other company in a short amount of time, but there's a reason why people say, "Don't run with scissors," of course, but Otto never deigned to listen to others.

Me, I'm just a person. Born and raised in Queens, my career as Spider-Man started small. Instead of rags to riches, you could say I was 'dirt to stars'. I started out at the bottom and knew what it was like to climb my way up without help. It's almost as if I became who I am simply _because_ I didn't seek power, or fame. Maybe, whatever force that controls that sort of thing liked that?

Regardless, I was the opposite of Otto in this. He wanted to claw his way up to the top no matter what, and I was willing to be carried by the wind on a webline. It was a hare and tortoise type of thing.

Otto's business plan for Parker Industries was an attempt to one-up not just Stark, but everyone. He _wanted_ to be a weapons manufacturer, but not just. Otto had his tentacles in every field of weaponized science there was, from nanities to cybernetic transplants to robotics to weaponized computer protocols. In his notes he refused to entertain the possibilities that he could ever fall into the mire of mistakes that those who came before him did. Rogue AI, corruption, espionage, all of it. He was Otto Octavius, the _Superior_ Spider-Man! And he couldn't, wouldn't, and was incapable of failing like the rest of 'those fools'.

'Parker wouldn't have even tried', he said. 'I am better. Superior.'

But _Parker_? That guy is smart enough not to get into a throwdown with a god. …Mostly. There was this thing with Thor a few years back, and I was a lot stronger than I used to be, but in the old days I was smart and careful.

Mostly. The only time _I'd_ be standing up against a god is when I had my back to the wall, or someone was in trouble. …So that ended up happening a lot. Otto wouldn't have done that, not for the sake of others. Just his own ego.

He wanted to stand up to the leviathans of this haunted water even though he and his company were just little fishes. He _would_ succeed. Except he wouldn't, thus the conundrum.

I was going to change that. That had been my goal ever since becoming the CEO. _This_ was my decision. After all, with Otto's history of failure, and my history of success, I could do it.

Not because I was arrogant. Not because I felt I was superior. The simple fact was I knew Otto's work better than anyone after fighting him constantly since I was fifteen, and that made me the best suited for the job – a successor, in a way.

I was also better off than him, being the last man standing and all. Hard to squash, and whatever 'superior' might be, I'm not only amazing.

Otto Octavius was… I don't think he _had_ a title. But Peter Parker? Spectacular. Sensational.

Spider-Man? Just plain determined. Put those two together and you get me _._

* * *

Sajani Jaffery was a woman I had worked with since Horizon labs. While she wasn't very friendly, or open, and didn't seem to be my biggest fan, she did seem to subconsciously realize the difference between myself and Otto, and upon my return she had changed in behavior. To be honest, this endeared me to her and I was grateful for what I quickly recognized to be a… code-switch of sorts. How she acted with Otto she did not with me, and so on, though she didn't seem to realize it.

Still, I hadn't seen her, technically, in over a year, and her behavior toward me was… unexpected. As I took charge and handled my business (no pun intended), I could tell she was impressed. No longer flagged down by the dichotomy of responsibility from either Parker or the webhead, I was able to devote myself, and if there were four things Sajani found attractive, it was dedication, focus, drive, and, apparently, me.

She had mellowed out, certainly. I remembered her as bitterly cold and sarcastic, but she had assumed a stance of being my left hand, with Anna being my right and she was more personable than I ever thought possible. For her, anyway. She had been, after all, somewhat of Peter Parker's very own J Jonah Jameson, albeit much more attractive and tolerable to listen to.

Jonah has his… good point, too, I suppose. In my experience, I got the shit end of the stick with him. Every other universe he's a pretty swell guy. Mine? Very wishy-washy.

So I assumed my identity as the CEO with ease, further impressing Sajani. My change in attitude and decorum, she had been told, was because I had been in an accident, specifically around the time Otto came to possess the symbiote.

When Spider-Man had wanted his old mechanic to drum up some new gadgets for his new look, in the ensuing chaos Parker had been thrown a loop. Rather than continuing to suffer from that amnesia, I was now fully healed from not only that, but my kidnapping and torturing at the hands of the Kingpin and Hobgoblin months prior.

Sajani had given me a pitying look, but there are few things women like more than a man who can walk away from an explosion. That was something I did so frequently I no longer bothered to look back at said explosion.

But I had never been a boss before, and the sudden jump up the food chain was confusing at first. Being no stranger to uncomfortable, stressful positions, I quickly oriented myself, due in no small part to the help of Anna and Sajani's surprising dedication.

And I'd be remiss if I didn't thank my illustrious _lifetime_ of _near-death experiences_ and perfect equilibrium. Wouldn't be where I am without them.

Though I was doing things differently than Otto, and that no doubt improved myself in her eyes even more, I was making progress in reducing the amount of fear the employees of the company had toward me. That in itself was just bemusing, but not new. In opposition to Otto's supervillainous, domineering and arrogant way of commanding, I was more measured.

I had the choice of following the example laid out for me by dozens of supervillain 'masterminds' over the years, or men like Steve Rogers. The choice was obvious, and with that, and with my history as a teacher I was used to giving orders to people who required to listen to me, and my history as Spider-Man making me used to being feared.

I have to say, the "beat the octopus piñata" parties _really_ hit it off. Decades later they were still going strong, and it turns out Otto would be remembered… as the man who tried to kill everyone.

Though she could be the opposite in temperament to Anna, Sajani wasn't like the devil on my shoulder to Anna's angel - she was the surly angel. While Anna encouraged me, Sajani caused me to think otherwise and though her efforts to get me to see the whole picture sometimes encroached on being annoying, I was grateful for not only that, but for her concern.

Chiefly, she urged me to attack the prospect of the company from all sides. She conceded (which was by itself a feat worthy of recording), that I had a great point, but urged that I, "Think, and think _hard_. Or else we're all _fucked_ , and I'm out of a job. Again." She said this with a blush, and it just so happened to be the morning Anna walked in by my side, limping distinctly.

Whoops.

And Sajani was… very attractive. At Horizon she wore a beanie and casual clothes, tight jeans. Working for me, a fact that she, surprisingly, had no visible problem with if any, she was garbed in a stuffy looking labcoat, which should have been a crime. I had only seen her out of it a few times, but I could see what had changed in my absence, like where all of the junk food she ate went to. I had no complaints.

I wasn't subjected to some of her tirades since I was now her boss, but others weren't so fortunate. As warmed up to me as her behavior was, it could still send other people in the opposite direction after her appearance lured men in.

She came up to only my collar bone, her attractive features belying her intellect and sharp, standoffish demeanor much the same way as her face, soft and feminine with a regal pout, along with an imperious scowl, was the perfect counter to her vast knowledge of poly-syllabic insults. It became readily obvious that few people could stand to be around her. We had that in common, which surprised me, but again I had no complaints.

The only time any of it was directed at me were the mornings where we met at work. She was punctual and dedicated, and soon our morning conversations became almost ritualistic. Walk in, trade smack talk, myself, Anna, and her would have coffee (which does absolutely nothingfor me), go to work.

And as much as I enjoyed it, I believe it was a great stress reliever for her when too much was there. Though as I had found out, Sajani had the female equivalent of blue balls and there are better ways to solve that instead of coffee.

She had without a doubt become my friend, which was something I never thought possible. I was grateful, and with this in mind, I even felt a little bad for her as we made our way to the meeting that day.

She was more stressed out than I had been, and I couldn't help but think, _"It's because she hasn't gotten laid_." She had that frizzy, almost wild eyed and pent up look that I remembered having. Poor gal.

She took a deep breath and turned to me, her chest heaving as she held the air in. "Okay, just-"

The air escaped heavily and she stopped walking. Anna was with us and we both stopped for her to finish breathing. It took seconds before Sajani closed her eyes and took a deep, calming breath that apparently didn't do her much good. "Are you _sure?"_ She asked me.

"Yes," I said simply. "I'm positive." I tried to convey the amount of confidence I felt, which was fairly substantial, but it didn't do much good.

Sajani looked at me intently and pursed her lips. I couldn't tell if it was because I had stubble on my face or if she was trying to look into my thoughts. "Are you _sure_ you're sure? Because we can reschedule, you know?" She asked again.

"Because after that accident- I mean you _lost_ your _damn mind,_ Parker _. Literally!"_ She hissed, referring to the reason why I had told her I was 'off', recently _._ In her own special, heartwarming way, she succinctly called it me, "Acting like an _asshole._ "

What followed was a look of disbelief. I understood completely, or thought I did. For me I hadn't seen her in over a year, and the last time I had I was still Peter Parker, secretive and goofy employee at Horizon labs. Now I was her boss. Weird, right?

Her eyes went from me, to Anna, and then me, and her brow furrowed, words catching in her throat. "I just-" she started.

"Sajani, I understand. You're worried," I said gently, knowing she was experiencing the brunt of what I had been feeling. I'd gotten good at calming people down and speaking levelly with them over the years, so it was child's play for me. "It's going to be fine. I need you to trust me, alright?" I asked, and, smiling, I laid my hand on her shoulder.

She blinked owlishly at me, wide eyes momentarily shocked, and then took a deep breath. Her upper lip curled into something that can't exactly be called a smile, but not a sneer either. It was a Sajani.

"Fine. But if it doesn't, you owe me a new job. Because if you don't…" she trailed off, and glared at me in a way only she could.

"Don't? And miss the chance to have the illustrious Ms. Jaffery at my side? Perish the thought, Sajani! I wouldn't miss that chance for the-"

Anna snorted but then, in a split second, I thought I saw something in my reflection on one of the reflective walls. It was quick, but I was quicker, and what I saw gave me extreme pause, though it could have been easily be attributed to our similarities. It was, of course, my reflection. Or at least it should have been.

I was wearing a smoky black suit with no tie, but had I had gray on my temples and more wrinkles, and a few more inches of height, I would have looked like myself, come the year 2099. I looked like the CEO already because I technically _was_ him, but now more than ever I bore a close resemblance to the head of Alchemax.

Then it was gone. I could have written it off, but I had seen too much in my life to do that. My mind began racing with what I knew of him.

I had been less than eager to assume my position as head of the company because of him, and how he lead a corrupt, country wide corporation at the turn of the century, but quickly got over it. For the most part, we were the same, but the differences were a mile wide. _I_ didn't try to rewrite the entire universe and play God, for one. Peter Parkers like him gave Parkers like me a bad name.

But the man knew how to run a company, apparently, and if _he_ had it in him, then so did I.

With his height, he was similar in stature to Kaine, or rather, Kaine looked more like him and thus, me. The CEO was that bridge between us, I suppose, since Kaine was what I could be, every facet of his personality, his body, a form of mine. His personality darker and cracked, like the CEO's, because of what he had gone through, his height my potential had I not stunted my growth in my teenage years by missing sleep and food. His powers and capabilities mine as well, and his tendency to stay by himself. Just like the CEO.

While they were both more of my dark side than Venom, but like both, Kaine and Brock had come back to the light, so to speak. Kaine was my brother, but I pitied the CEO. In the end though, Kaine, the CEO, and myself (metimes three), all had something in common. We were supposed to be dead.

That's the thing about Peter Parker, in any form, in any iteration, I guess. Hard to squash, and hard to stay squashed.

With that in mind, unless I was going insane, which was _always_ a fun possibility…

That meant this correlated, at least somewhat, with my other 'post-death' experiences. When I fought Thanos and Death, Death itself hung around me for a time. When I worked with Doc Strange to catch an astral projecting killer, I unleashed things like Shathra and Morlun upon myself, opened Pandora's Box. When I died at Morlun's hands after having _eaten_ him, I met the _Other_.

I could go so far as to say that when I died as a giant Spider, I came back with organic webbing for a time. That'd be reaching, but they really all were connected, and in a way that made me think.

It all was either something to do with me _,_ the spider, or the _other_. The _M_ _an_ , the _S_ _pider_ , or the _Other,_ and was the CEO? Me. A man. A _Spider_ -Man. But he was the _other_ me, not me, not quite, not yet.

I grimaced. I really, really did not need to be thinking about that right now, but fate has a funny way of stacking the cards it wants you to play right in front of you. You can flip the table, but it'll throw them in your face and tell you to play.

 _But_ there was _always_ the possibility I could be going insane. Jokingly, I wondered which possibility was better _._

"You look like you ate something awful," Sajani's voice reached my ears. It was pleasant, the slight hoarseness of her tone sending a tingle down my spine. "Marconi fuck up dinner for once?"

"At least I have a boyfriend to make dinner for," Anna replied goodnaturedly. "When was the last time you had a man, no, _anyone_ around your apartment?"

Sajani rolled her eyes and ending up looking at me for a second. She looked away. "Shut up," she said, scoffing.

Formerly, Sajani and Anna didn't like each other, though that was because they didn't know each other. Sajani was Peter Parker's former colleague, and Anna was his girlfriend. Given the fact that Sajani isn't very sociable with… anyone, and Anna didn't have a special desire to socialize with anyone more than necessary, they kept to their own circles, especially when Otto was in my shoes. Those circles meant me, in an ironic 'work wife', 'house wife' way.

"I just thought of something unpleasant," I said, shaking my head. There just isn't any way to say something like, "I think I'm being haunted by the spirit of my timeline displaced counterpart," in polite company, during work hours.

"Let me guess: Jaffery naked?" Anna teased, pointing at Sajani.

Sajani flushed. " _Wha_ \- I-!"

I stared at her appreciatively, teasingly, and she squawked. "What? Just admiring the view. Nice… labcoat, Sajani," I said, losing enthusiasm. Somewhere out there, someone had it bad for labcoats but it wasn't me.

"That might constitute as sexual harassment," Sajani said, trying to regain her cool and failing by the heavy blush on her features.

I smirked. "Might?"

"I _think_ she's propositioning you," Anna chuckled.

Sajani frowned. "It just so happens I _need_ this job," she sniffed. "So, don't take advantage of that, Parker."

"Tsk, there goes my asking you to join us for dinner then." I paused. "But really Sajani, thanks. For your efforts and care for the company… _and_ myself." I repressed a snort as she started to reply and ended up making a choking sound. "You're a good friend." In the corner of my eye I could see Anna looking at the both of us.

"…Friends? So, if I told you to not go through with this… you still wouldn't listen, would you?" she asked blandly, after a moment of silence.

"…Nah."

Sajani groaned. I winked at her and turned to Anna. "Do you think we can get the name of the company changed?"

"Probably. I mean the sign out front is destroyed still – we should get that fixed soon. Couple of hoops to jump through after that, but… what would you change it to?"

"Parkermax, Parker Foundation, Parker Indu-! Wait, wait, that one is taken…" I huffed. "All the good, and not so good, ones are taken. How about something mediocre?"

"Already got that."

"I was thinking of the Uncle Ben Foundation."

"I will kiss you and gently plead for you never to be so stupid," she said, smiling sincerely.

"Iwill too," Sajani said, raising her hand. " _What?"_ She snapped when we looked at her.

"I'm just lucky, and you just joked, that's what," I said, astonished. "By the way, I am _flattered,_ too."

She blinked at me before giving a bland, withering look to Anna, who shrugged. "I _can_ make jokes sometimes…" Sajani muttered.

"Flattering ones," I grinned. "Your backhanded compliments during our meetings in the morning _always_ lift my spirits. My ego has grown three sizes since this morning."

" _Mm_ ," Anna hummed, shooting me a look, "You think she enjoys them as much as you do?" She teased.

Once more Sajani tried to assume a look of indifference, and failed miserably. "I do _not_ look forward to-"

"Your morning ritual is none of our business," I said stolidly, waving my hand. Though, as an action befitting the CEO, that didn't feel right either. Too… Doom-ish. _'Fret not, Ms. Jaffery. Doom cares little for your predilections.'_

"We could always try the Marconi Institute," I offered, turning back to Anna.

"It will _not_ be the ' _Marconi Institute'_ ," Anna hissed with a rictus smile. "I'd rather see it named the ' _Jaffery Conglomerate'_ , and I'd die before I let that happen and take all of you with me."

"Thank you _so_ much for the vote of confidence," Sajani said.

"I just don't want a company named after _me_." I groused. "It's just so… arrogant. Self-centered. _Unimaginative_."

"It's not that bad," Sajani offered gently, causing the both of us to turn to her again. Just like that the gentleness was gone. She twitched. " _Stop_ looking at me like that."

"It's just that you're batting two for two on being nice to him," Anna said pointedly, though not harshly. "I'm starting to wonder."

I rolled my eyes. "Keep up the good work, Ms. Jaffery. My heart, and my ego, just grew two more sizes because of you," I joked. "I came up with that name when I was _out of my mind._ The Marconi Institute sounds a lot better. If people come to kill me, they'll look for someone with a ham radio."

Anna harrumphed. "So does _"Woman takes two with her into a fire, does not return_ ," she scoffed. " _Y_ _ou're_ the amazing one, Slick. You deserve the fate, I mean _honor,_ of owning a company named after yourself. Not me."

"Fantastic work turning a compliment into a punishment."

"Well, if you're in to that sort of thing," she winked at me, grinning at Sajani's once oblivious, now deliberately ignorant look. "And that's because it _is._ The day _my_ ego gets big enough to name a company after me is the day _I_ have tea with Ms. I-Hate-Fun."

"I'd much rather have tea with _Parker_ before I ever had lunch with you," Sajani scoffed, and her eyes flicked to me so fast I wouldn't have noticed it if not for my reflexes. As it was, it was obvious, but my experience with the cues of attraction was sadly dry in comparison to my superhero experience.

"I'm not surprised," Anna said dryly.

Sajani turned to me. "Which you _owe_ me… especially if this works. I've lost so much sleep because of this."

"Tea? Alright," I said easily. "You just made my day, Sajani."

Anna raised her eyebrow. "Maybe I'll teach her how to make 'breakfast' too." She bit her lip. "God knows your 'appetite' is as rapacious as can be."

"Not my fault my stomach is bottomless," I said, cluelessly, and even as I saw how Sajani stiffened, I didn't know why.

Anna pat my side affectionately. "Not your stomach I was talking about, Slick."

* * *

The meeting room was opulent and had a high-rise view of the city, skyscrapers and all. Very impressive, very expensive.

My childhood vertigo was of course long since extinct. The way the sun cast an early golden glow on the tallest buildings, and the sky had an orange blue pallor that showed the time, was beautiful _._

I spied Anna glancing at me from the corner of her eyes, watching me carefully _._ Sajani was a bit more stoic out of unease, though this made her walk like a robot and look like she had just eaten something unpleasant. They trailed behind me, talking quietly as we entered.

The board of directors sat at a short table with no more than six of them, and my first thought, in a very pot to kettle way, was that that was a lot of power to be shared between so few.

The sun spilled behind them, turning them into silhouettes with too fantastic timing to have _not_ been planned, and a faceless, somewhat ominous presence. It was an intimidation tactic I easily recognized and brushed off. I had seen worse. Staring into the toothy maw of Carnage or the Lizard over and over again left certain things like this, horror films, slasher films, sudden loud noises, imminent death, and mortal terror fairly underwhelming.

I managed to catch on to them whispering amongst themselves, which distracted me from Anna and Sajani's conversation. With my hearing being much better than a regular human's, I could hear the tail end of a now interrupted conversation. A woman with her hair in a bun sat in the center of the table, likely the leader.

"It was _specifically_ requested _they_ _look after-_ " she started, but was interrupted.

Another woman waved her hand. She had long, black hair and faced the window. "-Imm's responsibility in the first place, not theirs. And now he's dead."

The first woman scoffed at her, giving me the impression that she was not impressed. "Yes," she said, clearing her voice. " _Lucky_ for you _."_

"True," the other woman returned, eager to get the last word. "Very lucky. I am happy to be here."

I frowned. _Imms_? _Simms._ _Ezekiel_ Simms. Dead. But so was I. But everyone and their grandfather was getting brought back to life. That it could happen to Ezekiel wasn't a surprise if it did, I thought.

With my new outlook, I was far less than ready and eager to consider Ezekiel a friend after what he'd done. Specifically, he tried to sacrifice me to a gestalt spider creature named the Gatekeeper because he had _cheated_ whatever deity that doled them out like presents from _Oprah._

Going by what I knew… the Gatekeeper was the one that came to collect on debts. If the way I got my powers was 'natural', then Ezekiel had _bastardized_ it by way of ritual. Other than the Gatekeeper there was of course the Other, the… 'spider' side of me, in other words, the 'Other' in, "Are you the man, the spider, or the _other_?"

I still had no clue what that even meant.

And finally there was the Great Weaver, who was remarkably friendlier than the previous two, but just as eldritch. On a modest stretch of the astral plane, just south of Albuquerque, it was large, blue, and green, with dozens of spidery spires of legs that made me blink, but failed to make my skin crawl as it should have.

Pushing that away for the time being I turned to Anna, taking note of the lack of chairs for us. I planned to announce myself in typical webhead fashion. "Where are our chairs?" She shrugged. " _Hm_ , I at least want a table of my own to sit at," I joked, and gestured at the directors. " _They_ get one. Now I'm going to feel left out," I said more loudly.

The woman in the center of the table stood up and greeted us with a nod, and me by promptly apologizing for the lack of chairs. I felt as though I had seen her before.

"I- _we,"_ she sighed, sparing a brief, pointed glance at the rest of them at the table, specifically the other woman that didn't bother to look at me, "are terribly sorry for the lack of seats at this meeting, Mr. Parker," she said, a reflected light to her as she stood, which allowed me to see her face.

She was very attractive, with an intelligent look of someone used to working with their mind, and dressed the part of someone in business. "Please, call me Peter," I said, looking her in the eye and extending my hand.

She paused, visibly caught off guard by that. It made sense to me at the time; they were used to dealing with Otto, who couldn't be polite unless his ego was being stroked sycophantically. They had been expecting that, and I didn't doubt the lack of chairs was an attempt to piss him off. I liked them already.

The woman caught herself and shook my hand daintily and softly, her hands smooth and much smaller than mine. The hairs on my veiny wrist stood up at the same time and a shiver ran down my spine, which I attributed to making contact with, put simply, a stunning woman. She was approachable and demure looking, yet held herself with confidence.

She held my gaze with faint, purple eyes framed by her dark blonde hair. I realized I was staring and smoothly retrieved my hand, causing her to frown ever so slightly.

Of course, I had no idea what _any_ their names were; Anna had been unable to tell me because Otto was careful about which secrets he told, which unsurprising.

My only option was to bullshit my way through this until an opportunity presented itself, which is why I requested she call me by my first name. I'm good at that. One of the best.

"I'd like some seats for Ms. Marconi and Ms. Jaffery here."

"But not yourself," she quickly observed, like she was trying to figure something out. She smiled rather excitedly, almost like she was relieved. "Fine, Peter, but I'd like you to call me by my name."

 _Bingo. Parker, you sly dog don't break your back while you pat it with superhuman strength…_

"That'd be terribly unprofessional."

"But unprofessional is _fine_ for you?" She asked, amused.

"It's my _trademark_."

Her lips curled into a soft show of amusement, and her laugh was as soft as a huff. "It _would_ be terribly unprofessional. Miserably so, but misery loves company, and I'd hate to leave you alone," she smiled and, briefly, her eyes darted to the other board members who quickly avoided it, as short as it was.

The blatant flirting had caught me off guard as I wasn't used to it, but once more she grasped my hand, actively seeking it and holding it pleasantly. My entire arm tingled for some reason. "… _Orre_. Orre Simms."

The long haired woman snorted.

"Simms? As in…" I trailed off. She was far too young to be his Ezekiel's wife, though I didn't know Ezekiel's taste. She looked to be somewhat older than me, though, so that gave a vague timeline for the sowing of his wild oats.

" _Ezekiel Simms,"_ she said with a barely restrained tone of distaste. "Entrepreneur, philanthropist, and absentee father."

"I'm… sorry for you loss," I said, and retracted my hand, causing her to frown softly at, what I thought, was what I said. "He was… a good man," I half lied.

"Few people knew of him, Peter, or knew him in any case. I barely did. Did _you_ know him? I've heard that you're quite brilliant, but my father usually turned charity and attention to those who he felt 'needed' it. _Not_ those who deserved it."

I repressed a wince at the implications of what her relationship with Ezekiel could have been like. With how he was willing to betray me, and before even that leave me to die, I wouldn't stake any claims on him being a good father.

"I hadn't ever met him," I lied, straight through my teeth. "But the brother of one of my former students was really helped out by your father. He changed his life, gave him an opportunity to better himself."

"Yes, you were a teacher for a time, if I recall," she said, smiling at the thought. Then her expression soured, and she said, though didn't sound as she believed it herself, "Father always was the… giving sort. But let's talk on more pertinent matters."

She returned to her seat and called for two chairs only, and I felt the eyes of the rest of the directors on me, looks ranging from interest to amusement, which was surprising. I gathered they were fairly warmed over to the Peter Parker Otto had been, though Orre had seemed refreshingly amicable.

Two employees clamored into the room after being buzzed in with the practiced ease of doing what they were told. I was helping them carry the chairs into the room before anyone knew what I was doing, and no one was more surprised than they were.

I thanked them and clapped one on the shoulder. The kid couldn't have been older than twenty, likely an intern relegated to menial work for credit, and jumped. I snickered a little at that. They both scurried out of the room and I carried the chairs over to Anna and Sajani.

Turning to Orre, I was surprised that she was looking right in my eyes, but didn't show it. They were purple and intense, but I had been far more uncomfortable in the past. The day I feel looking at an attractive woman is uncomfortable is the day I… stop thinking that, because it wouldn't last long. "You wanted to talk? Let's talk."

Her expression became intrigued. "Of course. At first, we only meant for this meeting to be short, simply a 'checkup' as it were into the going-ons of Parker Industries. What with the damages to the building, and all."

"After the explosions and destructions caused by _another_ Green Goblin," a male board member said, not bothering to hide his exhaustion with the title, "it was no question to move the meeting up sooner. Next time there might not be a building to have the meeting _in."_

" _Norman Osborn_ is a _…_ What was that word you used, Simms? A _cockwaffle?_ " the woman with her back turned asked, tilting her head slightly in Orre's direction. The blonde grunted.

"I do believe _this_ time it was some chap by the name of _Banks,_ " another man huffed, blatantly doubting the name was legit. "He appears to be in a coma. Let's hope it stays that way."

"However, judging by the request for chairs, I take it you wanted to speak at length, Peter?" Orre asked.

"No, he wanted to have tea and talk gossip with you. Of _course_ he did." The woman by the window traded, a laugh in her voice.

"Then why didn't he ask for a chair for himself?"

"…Quiet."

" _Regardless_ of Peter's predilections for standing," Orre sighed deeply, lightly rubbing her temple as she gave me a tired, lingering smile. "I believe _he_ should speak instead. _Peter_?"

I nodded. "I wish to discuss the future of Parker Industries."

Orre raised her eyebrow and smiled. "Well, _Peter_?" she asked, interlocking her hands over the table. "You have my attention."

" _Our attention,"_ the woman at the window said, and was pointedly ignored by Orre.

I started to speak, and didn't look away from her until she looked away from me, which took a minute or so. After a few seconds of this though, I started to realize that the violent shiver down my spine wasn't as coincidental as I had hoped.

* * *

The celebrations came quietly. Anna brought the glasses and food, Sajani brought wine and cups. Even Miguel had come, bringing a fantastic little piece of paper, otherwise known as his check that he hadn't been able to cash. The fact that his bank of choice had been held up had unsurprisingly little to do with it, he just didn't know how.

He even arrived at my lab where we celebrated and asked, waving the check in front of me, _"How the_ hell _do I use_ this _?"_

Sajani spent a few moments trying to get the wine cork to pop out, and it finally made an echo that ricocheted throughout my lab as she pulled with effort. She topped off my glass, looking more relieved than I had seen her in a while. She filled her glass up almost to the brim and took a large sip before she held it up. "To Parker Industries! To Parker!"

Anna Maria rolled her eyes. "To Peter Parker!"

"And to my new check." Miguel said blandly, waving the piece of paper around. "So," he said bluntly, "How do I use this thing?"

Sajani snorted, taking it as a joke. She swallowed heavily and gave me what I discerned was an apologetic look, although on her it looked more reluctant. "I have to admit Parker, I… I didn't think this was a good idea, but you proved me wrong," she said, conveying humility in her own, special way until Anna interrupted her.

"Are you trying to apologize for not trusting your boss _?"_ Anna asked smugly.

"I'm trying to say that I _underestimated_ him and that it showed a distinct lack of faith in hi-" Anna just smirked. "Fine, yes, _I'm sorry."_

"It's fine, Sajani. To be honest, I mostly did it to piss you off," I said, hoping to get a rise out of her. "You do this thing with your- _that's_ the one! It's cute."

The 'thing' as it were, was how her bottom lip would quiver. She scoffed. "You're… _good_ at that. Keep it up, Parker."

With that, Sajani had taken to including herself in my 'Inner Circle', such as it was. Her line of reasoning was that if Mike O'Mara of Alchemax could be invited into Peter Parker's lab without scrutiny, she could too. I didn't object of course, which actually caught her off guard. I suppose she expected me to be keeping secrets as I had during my days at Horizon Labs where I wouldn't let anyone in. I wasn't, but Anna had a list of reasons, and listed them one after another. Sajani had ignored all of them. Anna ignored her ignoring.

"You have puppies to go chase with a vacuum cleaner…" Anna listed, counting a fourth finger that actually stood for the nineteenth reason. "You have a J Jonah Jameson fanclub rally to attend… I took the liberty of signing you up for a free muzzle fitting this afternoon…"

Sajani ignored it like a gargoyle and looked at me. "So what was the deal with you and the board leader? Orre Simms, you two acted like you knew each other." I raised my eyebrow at that. There was definitely a hint of familiarity I felt, but nothing of what Sajani said.

"She was flirting with him," Anna said flatly. "You two seemed to get along fairly well. I'm surprised."

"Jealous?" Sajani asked, taking her turn to give the shorter woman a smug, knowing look.

Anna shrugged. "Why should I be? She seemed attracted to him, and she isn't the only one," she paused, looked at Sajani for a moment, and continued, "I'm _proud_ , if anything. My boyfriend is an eye-catcher, and I have him _all_ to _myself_."

Sajani rolled her eyes. " _So_ happy for you…"

"Wait… Simms?" Miguel asked. "As in-"

"Ezekiel Simms," Sajani, quoting Orre from earlier, said as she did her best to be civil. "Owned an old, pretty quiet company. Have you heard of them?"

Miguel gave me a brief glance that I recognized as somewhat important. "Not particularly. I heard the name, thought it was the last name of someone in the chewing gum business."

"I have never met Orre Simms before in my life," I said honestly, stopped for a moment to glare at Anna, and continued, "But I knew of her father. Like I said earlier, he helped out the brother of an old student of mine when I was still a substitute. That's all."

Sajani frowned. "You never told me you were a teacher," she replied.

"You never asked. Anna asked, Miguel asked, even a taxi driver a couple of days ago asked. You didn't."

"Would you have _told_ me if I had?" She asked.

I sighed, knowing she still expected me to be keeping some secrets. She was right, but the only secret I was keeping was that I knew Spider-Man on a personal level twice over, and that, technically, he was sitting across from me at the table. "Of course I would have. We're _friends,_ Sajani. We talk, ask, and annoy each other. But I'm _better_ at all of that than you. You need practice."

She tried to frown, but I managed to get her to crack a smile. "Yeah, whatever. You are." She looked at Anna, who looked back and rolled her eyes in a silent exchange. "Friends."

As curious as I was about the way Anna and Sajani seemed to be having a silent conversation, if their widening eyes and barely muted gestures were anything to go by, I was more occupied with sorting out with what I had experienced that day.

The meeting had been a complete success. In short, the meeting was like this: I made the decision to change the direction of the company, the BoD agreed. I hand-picked some employees to hire for security (the Spider-ling contingent of Otto's, as I couldn't just leave them on their own – this also netted Parker Industries the sterling reputation of hiring our troops), as well as Oliver Osnick, who was now one of my engineers as well as the techie of the security team, who had also been aiding me with a prototype I had been working on. This team would be tasked as a private security force to help around the city for when other heroes and emergency responders could not make it. I had also suggested the former employees of Horizon labs as well.

Parker Industries in its totality wouldn't become a manufacturer of robotics. It would become the leading developer of, to name a couple of things, cybernetic prosthetics and medical supplies to help the betterment of mankind. Looking out for the little guy and normal problems that could make every day things less of a pain in the ass and didn't paint a large target on our back. Utilitarian stuff, street-level. It'd be Parker Industries that would end up creating a doctor-in-a-box years later, among other life-saving inventions.

The Board of Directors was a friendly neighborhood bunch, to say the least. Orre Simms was… enigmatic. A brief inspection of Otto's notes, through all of the gloating about being a 'superior' Peter Parker that turned them into a sad excuse for a memoire, showed he thought they were fools, but confessed to an opposing feeling to Orre Simms.

She had been 'somewhat oppressing' and 'very inquisitive' to him, and Otto had gone as far to say he felt as if she was constantly being gauged by her, measured, as if she knew his true identity.

Then, it regressed back into his gloating, and how he doubted someone as simple as the daughter of a 'reclusive old fool' could be any threat to him since he had no knowledge of her relation to Ezekiel, or Ezekiel himself, as he had already erased what remained of my memories at that point.

A companionable silence followed. I could see Miguel off to the side, using the brief lull to speak to Lyla, his AI companion, in whispers, asking her how he was supposed to use a piece of paper for money.

"I'm just saying," he said, as we got into a discussion about the validity of something as singular as a toaster in the modern world, "You have mini ovens capable of cooking toast, pizza, and everything else. What the _shock_ do you need a toaster for?"

Anna was whispering to Sajani, and from the looks of it, it was an intense, but oddly civil discussion. Sajani looked more restrained than usual, and flushed. Anna caught my glance and winked, and in that moment Sajani purposefully looked around the room.

She made an impressed sounding noise. "I thought you said you'd _stop_ working for the webhead?"

"I said no such thing," I said primly, assuming my CEO-who-bullshits voice, all the while distinctly unaware of what Otto may have claimed. "Some of my best work is during times of necessity, thanks to him. If nothing else it keeps me busy and serves as an inspiration."

She gave me a withering look. "Just make sure those responsibilities to the webslinger don't interrupt your duties to your _company_ ," she paused, "Peter."

I raised my eyebrow. First name basis? I really must have impressed her. "No promises, Sajani. By the way, you have something in your teeth," her fingers scrambled to her mouth. "Wait, that's just- it's nothing. Or is it? Did you have a salad today? Broccoli?"

Her lip twitched. " _Never_ change Parker."

I grinned. "No plans to, especially not now."

"Anyways," Miguel clapped me on the back and began pouring himself a glass. "You know what would have been idiotic? Using that 'Spider-Island II' place to build another prison."

"Jesus Christ, who would _ever?_ That's so _stupid!"_ Anna exclaimed, looking incredulous at the thought of _another_ Raft prison in New York.

Sajani, for her part, looked _horrified_ at the possibility and voiced my thoughts, shuddering, "Parker isn't stupid," she said, and I took note that she hadn't said, "Parker isn't _that_ stupid," This was a notable improvement.

I sighed dreamily. "Your continued faith in me is what helps me get up in the morning."

"Yeah, whatever," she waved it off, obviously eager to not think about it, "You're a genius… Peter," she stopped, frowning at how much difficult she had saying my name. "Sometimes _. Every once in a while._ I was so intent on wanting Parker Industries to make a big splash I hadn't even considered the competition, or the fact that the field we were entering is essentially a battlefield."

"This 'Let's be nice and compliment Peter Parker' thing is kind of weirding me out," I laughed as she rolled her eyes. "I like it."

Her lips curved into a soft smile as she looked at me. "Good." Anna hummed pleasantly.

"Robotics are a dangerous thing when not handled correctly, and we've all seen just how volatile that field is. Sometimes I wonder if the world is truly ready for them." Miguel opined.

"How many times do you think Iron Man's suit has had its security measures overridden?"

"Exactly."

"Anyway, my goal isn't to make a big splash, it's to help people. Always has been. And robotics, cybernetics, that's… Not a good idea. They're an investment in the _future_." Miguel snorted inelegantly. "But I look around and I see no one looking out for the people of _today_. The world needs _someone_ focused on the _now_. Securing the future is fine and dandy, but not if it means forgetting the problems of the present."

"Most wouldn't expect much from such a utilitarian venture," Anna said, looking at me with a fond look. She refilled her glass to a fraction of itself and swirled it around. "That means most won't expect much from _us_ , and _that_ gives us the advantage. Keeps prying eyes away."

Sajani grinned at her. First time for everything. "Why make a big splash when you can steal all the water?" Sajani laughed, and she looked at me again, right in the eye, and bit her lip.

I stared right back. "Parker Industries is the underdog. And what do underdogs do, Migs?"

He chuckled. "That's easy. We _win_."

I grinned. "I _do_ like the sound of winning."

"That's what I like to hear!" Sajani hollered, taking my hand and yanking it to the ceiling triumphantly. "To Parker Industries!"

" _To Parker Industries!"_

"And to a better name…" I muttered.

Anna rolled her eyes. "Anything but the Marconi Institute."

* * *

Eventually the little party, such as it was, died down. Miguel had duties at Alchemax, or more accurately shadowing his ancestor Tiberius Stone to make sure he did nothing shifty. Mike O'Mara had built an immediate rapport with him as his assistant thanks to that tricky old time travel thing that, for some reason, attracts your ancestors to you like magnets.

And by rapport, I mean that Miguel had quickly become a lackey and a manservant. I was surprised he hadn't snapped yet, his existence be damned.

Sajani had gotten a little… tipsy. We drove her home knowing that 'tipsy' was an understatement. We couldn't leave her in my lab – I trusted Sajani to a certain degree, and trusted my own security measures even more so, but I didn't know what a drunken Sajani Jaffery was capable of at the time.

Now, I can actually handle my liquor... Mostly. My healing factor burns through any intoxicants in a way similar to dropping water on a very hot pan. This results in me getting the full flash first, be it from medicinal drugs or alcohol. On the bright side, because for any sickness that was too powerful for my healing factor to outright destroy, I'd receive only a flash of the worst part and be right as rain. After that, I'm an industrial grade sponge that can drink most lushes not just under the table, but out of the bar.

Sajani had the alcohol tolerance of a _kitten._

No more than three glasses of wine and she was noticeably sloshed. As her boss there was no way I could let her drive home. It was another thing that I didn't know about her. The next was that she was a bit … handsy. Anna found it pretty funny. So funny that she recorded the entire thing.

Sajani's hands were in a lot of places, chiefly on my chest, stomach, and arms, groping with such depth that the bagging clothing of my dress shirt and suit did nothing to impede her. With either the clarity of a functional drunk or false sobriety, she looked up at me and frowned as if I hadn't told her I ran over her puppy. "I didn't know you were ripped."

"You didn't ask," I said, amused and without an ounce of self-consciousness. Anna didn't have any issue with this and I certainly didn't, not after talking to the woman who raised me with Anna between my legs at the same time, and then her talking to said woman while remaining in the same spot.

"Surprised, Jaffery?" Anna asked, grinning at the brown skinned woman as we rounded a corner and I scanned the doors for Sajani's apartment. "He has a lot more underneath those clothes, you know."

Sajani blinked slowly. "He… does?" She asked, and then looked at me, and then down like she was waiting. "I have- I have more underneath my clothes _too,"_ she said, and puffed her cheeks.

She lurched, tipping forward, which made her tighten her grip on me. I caught her easily and gently pulled her back up. She gave me a bashful look that made her hair spill over her heated face. "Thanks," she said. "…You're not the only one with secrets, you know," she said quietly.

"It's not a secretif someone else knows, Jaffery," Anna snorted.

"Oh," Sajani made a popping noise with her lips, looked at me, and then away. "Right."

I looked at Anna again but the camera was back up to her eye and she flashed me a mischievous grin that I recognized. It was the same grin she had that morning when she pranced around my kitchen, naked, and then effectively told the table in my living room to move with only her ass. But no, I thought, I was seeing things. It couldn't be.

"Anna…?" I asked, not willing to write anything off. I looked at her intently, and she grinned. With a wink and a wave, she bid us to start walking again.

We stopped at Sajani's door, a simple red but well-furnished door amidst creamy walls, the layout of which was what I expected from her. Sajani was slumped into me as we stopped, and Anna Maria was at my opposite side. Sajani started to trace circles on my chest in a… telling, honestly pleasant way that beat bullets and lasers, or shrapnel. Or magic. Or acid. Or-

"Sajani? Sajani, we're here," I said, jostling her a little. Her head shook, raven hair spilling over her features, and she looked up at me with overly slow blinks. "Get your keys," I said.

"Slick, she's in no condition to unlock her door," Anna said, shaking her head. "Let's get her inside. Then we can see what goes on in the ice queen's frozen domicile," she said, and somehow managed to wrangle her hands manically while holding her camera, willfully ignorant that the said ice-queen was right next to me.

If Sajani minded she didn't show it, only sparing a brief glance over her shoulder at Anna before shrugging, or nodding, and then turning to look at me. She came up to my shoulder, barely, and tilted to look up at me, her breath heavy and stained with wine and her eyes half lidded. "Sorry, about this," she said.

I was surprised by her bashfulness, but it was a welcome change of pace from how abrasive she could sometimes be. I certainly had no complaints. "Sajani, it's fine. We're friends, right?"

"Friends?" She repeated. Then, she pressed herself against me. "Can't we be… more?"

Anna took the keys from my hand and jingled them to get my attention. It was at that moment that I noticed Sajani's keychain… was a Spider-Man keychain. Belatedly, I thought about how I hadn't gotten a single cent in royalties.

Anna found the right one and opened the door. Meanwhile, unless Sajani was especially drunk… she was flirting. With me. At the time I considered our conversations to be goodnatured ribbing, but then again I was rarely ever in a friendship with a woman that didn't make her disinterest in me obvious. Poor me.

Or… she was flat out confessing. And Anna was alright with that. Which meant that everything up to that point between me and Sajani was flirting as well which meant-

My head was spinning as Sajani held on tight to me and nuzzled her head into my chest. Her fingers lingered and briefly squeezed at the edges of my hand, my forearms, and every part she could get her hand on in a way that didn't leave anything to imagination, or doubt that she liked what she felt, was impressed by it, and wanted to feel it more with her coveting, groping hands. She knew what she was doing as she my arm aside to get closer to me, and then wrapped it around her. When she stepped in front of me just as we started to walk again and pressed her ass into my crotch, or the way her lips trailed along my chin, standing on her toes so I could smell the faint spicy, fruit scent of her hair.

Anna grabbed my hand and Sajani had a monopoly on my arm as they led me inside. Sajani sighed and Anna giggled and I…

I was wondering about how many ways you could mistake a proposition for a _fucking_ _threesome_.

In my experience, there are absolutely none _._

* * *

The 'real' celebration, as Anna called it, hit a small snag for one simple reason.

Sajani was a slob.

The afterhours world of Sajani Jaffery was a mess of an apartment. Her couch cushions were used as floor pillows before a humongous tv, that sat atop an expensive and crowded looking shelf, which also held an extensive library of gaming systems as well as games, all of which were haphazardly arranged and placed. Empty dishes piled up in the sink and notes everywhere as well as books, which was no small testament to her intelligence. She had a well-stocked and well-kept bookshelf, for what it was worth, but the books themselves were poorly arranged and I doubted anyone but Sajani herself could traverse.

They led me to her room, from which was a frightening effigy of a corpse that didn't make it. That is, a bed sheet spanned the length of the hallway, looking as though it tried and failed to crawl away from some atrocity.

Sajani, even as drunk as she was, was mortified. Although apparently not mortified enough to separate from me, but enough to refuse to look me in the eye, or face, or in my direction at all.

Her room was significantly cleaner, as though she hadn't slept in it in some time, and I laid her on the bed. Insistently she pulled until I set down with her, and Anna, with a small noise of excitement, set down her camera on the dresser across from us and sat down next to me.

Being used to spur of the moment things like dodging bullets, doing death defying acrobatics, having sex on the ceiling, that sort of thing, I was a bit caught off guard. Anna's hand against my crotch told me what I needed to know, though.

This was happening, and I was, evidently, a lucky fucking bastard. Which is true.

"You…" I gestured at Sajani, getting right to the meat of it, as Anna got to mine. Sajani frowned, bit her lip, and chewed on her fingers before nodding finally, but said nothing. "That's… surprising."

"Not… Not really. You're just dense," she said in a kind way, if that was possible. It was hard to be offended when she looked so… shy. I immediately decided that I preferred her that way. "For a while now, if you were wondering."

Anna had stopped moving and scoffed at us. "So… are we going to fuck now or what?"

Sajani grumbled something in a drunken slur that I vaguely recognized as, "He hasn't said _yes_ yet."

As warm as I felt inside by her desire for my consent, the fact that Anna was gently cupping my genitals in her hand kind of made that point moot. "Yeah Slick," she started, and while looking up at me unzipped my fly, unbuttoned my pants, unzipped my belt and ran her hand across my boxers, all the while getting in Sajani's line of sight, "What do you think? Yes, or yes?"

Anna was recording and I was thinking _, '_ What did I ever do to deserve this?'

Let's just chalk it all up to karma.

* * *

Anna Maria's soft hands slipped into my waistband and wrangled my shirt out, but I didn't need the excited scramble of her digits to tell me that wasn't her goal. Her hands hot and caressed my skin almost obsessively with heated familiarity, making it obvious that she had been looking forward to this.

At that I raised my shirt and, if it was possible to feel eyes rove over your body, then mine would have had track marks. As it was, I could still feel the hairs on my chest and arms stand up from the attention of two attractive women. To say nothing of other things.

Sajani mouthed something, and Anna smirked almost arrogantly, shooting her a look that perfectly managed to capture, "I told you so," in a curl of the lips. "Yes, it's a fucking _eight pack._ You want to see what else he hides behind those clothes, Jaffery?"

Anna asked a question that didn't need to be asked. Sajani was staring at me, transfixed, and I took pleasure in being the sole object of her affections, as well as her attentions as her eyes roved over my body. There was no mistaking that look.

Anna lifted up my shirt from the side and ran her tongue along my oblique in a long, lascivious lick that slid to the front. "If you behave yourself, I'll let you. You only have to ask nicely."

Sajani swallowed. She had stopped short in my face, almost kissing me, but Anna's teasing had cornered her like a deer on the road. I brought her forward. Her lips were wet and trembling, her heart beating so hard I could feel it in her throat when my tongue came out and caressed her own, her saliva tasting like wine, but she certainly didn't mind. She sighed in that brief, tortured moment, fretting with her hands before they made their way to me in an almost reverent way, and certainly an apprehensive one. I took pleasure from that; seeing Sajani change from her usual standoffish self was a treat on its own. Knowing it was because of me was icing on the cake, a fire in my stomach.

With that meek gesture, and the fact that her lips were smacking somewhat noisily against mine in an unskilled but nonetheless eager kiss, Sajani had given her answer. Anna giggled from between my legs.

The attention made the discomfort grow rapidly in my pants; from the smell of faint spices of Anna to Sajani's nameless perfume, I bucked, and Anna seemed absolutely eager to relieve my 'stress', and to alleviate the swelling in my pants. It just so happened that she had an assistant for the task, now, and she was eager to show her how it was done.

Her hands left my torso, letting my shirt drop, and immediately went to my pants and waist. I put my hands on top of Sajani's waist, glad that her stuffy coat was gone, and slid them appreciatively down her every curve, from her waist to her hips to her thighs, my fingers making her shiver.

Anna undid my belt, and my pants began to sag. After she undid the zipper they began to fall, and the brief protest Sajani gave died in her throat. Anna trailed kisses up my thigh, touching me with her lips in every place except where I wanted her most, and Sajani jumped as I smacked against one of her legs, surprised by the feeling and the force behind it. She snaked her arms around my neck, pulling herself closer.

Anna had a problem with that. " _Hey!"_ She protested. "I'm trying to suck him off here!"

"You're doing a pretty bad job of that," I said blandly.

"You don't get to complain," she chirped, grinning, and grinned into my not long for this world boxers.

"I… can't say this is how I thought _this_ would happen," Sajani rasped, wine stained her breath in my face, hot, heavy, and panting. "But it beats worrying about being turned down-"

"And it's a little too late for that, I think," I interjected, smiling reassuringly at her.

She smiled back, and her lips met mine in a soft, chaste kiss that soon became more before she pulled away, albeit reluctantly. She had to breathe after all. "Yeah… Fucking _finally_. I mean, just get a damn _clue_ , Parker…"

Her lips moved to mine again and her tongue slipped into my mouth, but I had other plans. I trailed down her to her neck, less kissing and more roving, attacking her, delighting in the fact that she was, at least severely, ticklish, with the insistent pressure and a wet slide of my tongue sending excited tingles up her spine making her fail to restrain her squeals.

Anna looked up at us, and then at me. "She needs work," she said wryly, and her hands made their way into my boxers where I was more than a little over half-mast.

" _I'm_ her boss, and I have some work for her," I replied with a smirk, and Anna bit her lip. She hefted my crotch with her soft hands, shaking the hardening flesh gently, but not yet taking off my boxers, still content with fondling my sack like it was fruit in a store. " _D_ for seduction, Sajani. At least you have an actual letter from the word now."

"What, are you my teacher now?" Sajani shot back, not looking at all displeased with that. "Mr. Parker?"

"You're the one that was so curious about my life," I replied, looking into her eyes.

"I am," she admitted, slurring her words slightly. "I… need to become a little more… familiar with you. We're co-workers, after all."

I smirked. "I can teach you a few things."

"Then I guess I could use more _practice_. Would you like to help me study, _Mr. Parker_ _?"_

"If you're asking anyone, you should be asking me," Anna opined, "But, you already got my vote. Because I felt sorry for you."

"I don't _care_ about your vote."

"Oh, you wonderful, desperate, _lonely_ Christmas cake. If you want to _ride my boyfriend,_ you should," Anna hummed, waving her off and going back to her task. She dove into my boxers and, with an extreme familiarity, stroked me inside my boxers until they were stretched more than they were meant to, her hands going over every vein and rigid angle with the smoothness of silk.

Then, she pulled my boxers down. It was slow, but deliberate, and I could see her eyes were more on me than they were on Sajani's reaction as she said, "If you want to play with him, with _this_ ," she grunted cutely but the underwear met an immutable resistance, my shaft catching at the elastic band. Deciding to help her out, and myself as well, I pulled out. Not something I have to do often.

" _God in Heaven!"_ Sajani hissed, her hand to her mouth and her teeth digging into her lip at the sight of it, now no longer an insistent pressure against her body, but something her eyes could gauge and afterward becoming crosseyed.

Anna wrapped herself around my leg and placed a little kiss right on the tip. It lasted longer than I thought it would, and progressed downward where she alternated between one kiss for one hanging, heavy orb to another. I groaned, pleased, when she gave the swollen softball sized egg a suck. "If you want this," She roamed her hands around every part of me that she could reach, nuzzling me affectionately like a cherished possession, which I didn't mind tin the least, "you're going to have to care about _my_ vote."

Then she looked up, a mischievous look in her eye. "But, I doubt you can handle it."

" _No shit I can't!"_ Sajani hissed. "He's too fucking _huge!"_

"That's the nicest thing you've said about me," I said, and she glared at me. "Well, other than the, you know, heartfelt confession, which ah…I _greatly_ appreciate."

Anna waved, and by waved I mean waved me in her hand at Sajani to get her attention, which was an easy thing, and my thing twitched in her grasp. "Not if you do it properly," she continued on, and motioned for Sajani to join her. Sajani frowned, looking far more comfortable with being at my side than between my legs, but finally made to move. Then, as an afterthought, she kissed me like she'd never get to do it again, her lips sucking on mine as she pulled away.

Never one to be shown up by Anna, Sajani dropped to her knees slowly, but still looked at the shaft between my legs as if it was some sort of monster. I enjoyed the expression. Her eyebrows upturned, she mouthed something I couldn't accurately describe because it wasn't actually words, just a string of curses, and maybe prayers.

She gasped again, her mouth open wide and gaping like a fish, and if it hadn't already, the shock in her eyes told that she wasn't expecting what she saw, and that it was exacerbated by having a front row seat with it right in her face.

She looked at Anna in something approaching respect, but most definitely incredulity, and looked her up and down. " _How?"_ She asked, gesticulating wildly. "He'd fucking rip you in half!"

Anna licked her lips, more at home with waving it in her own face than answering. The accurate reply to Sajani would be stubborn, determined, and repeated practice. A wet fling of fluid went from the tip to Anna's finger and she swiped it off and licked it up without preamble, and started to jerk me with a languid, casual ease.

"It's exactly what you said. Practice." Anna shrugged as if it was no big deal, but the smug look on her face said everything.

"Practice. Practice!" Sajani huffed with a fair amount of insanity. "Yeah… it explains your fucking limping."

"I'd say it'd explain why you're such a stuck up bitch," Anna said casually. "Either you have something like _this,"_ she gave me a long, appreciative stroke, "up your ass, or you don't get much of _anything_ up _anywhere_. No wonder you can't take it, you're probably so dry you forgot how to."

" _Ladies_ ," I interrupted, "I'm not the type of guy who enjoys catfights, so if you could please get along for my sake?"

Anna smirked and rolled her eyes. "Only for you." She turned to Sajani, "Here, grab it. It's not going to bite you, stupid. Maybe _spit_ on you, but you get used to that."

Sajani glared at her but hesitantly wrapped her fingers around me and gave me a small, embarrassed smile. Anna hadn't let go and their hands collided and for a moment they glared at each other, both sets of their digits failing to wrap completely around.

"I figure… I'll lose this buzz in a couple of hours, wake up in my apartment with little to no memory of what I've said or done, alone," she muttered, getting slightly louder the more she talked. She matched Anna's movements with a growing confidence, but her fingers would jump at every twitch I gave off. I was content to let the two of them work, and more than slightly entranced with the look on her face that I'd never thought I would see. Awed, and eager, and all for me. Karma, alright.

"The experience of waking up alone-"

"Again, I'd wager," Anna added.

Sajani glared at her, as if they both weren't on their knees in front of me. "-will make me masturbate furiously to your picture while I toss darts at it because _your_ boyfriend isan _idiot_."

It took a couple of seconds for that to sink in. "…You have a _picture_ of me?" I asked, but was ignored.

"Don't put him entirely on me," Anna huffed. "He's your problem now too. Enjoy not being able to walk straight, Jaffery," Anna said in what I suppose was my defense, huffing. My revenge was my hand on her ass, clapping against her full, round cheeks in the air. She gave me a piss-poor imitation of a reproachful look that I ignored.

"You're both _such_ sweet _-_ talkers," I said.

"I'd… be a lot of things for you," Sajani swallowed. "…Willing to put up with a little discomfort in the morning, at least."

"Are you blind as well as lonely?" Anna taunted, unable to resist taunting her further, "A 'little' and Slick don't fit in the same sentence," she grinned and wrenched me from Sajani's hands possessively, catching her by surprise. She had gotten a bit hypnotized, slowly edging closer with both hands on me, stroking with an empty-headed purpose. Now she blinked and shook herself, and frowned and tried to take me back, but Anna clicked her tongue. "You're going to be fucking limping _just_ like I do, Jaffery. Might even need to take a couple of days off if you can manage to get out of bed. You sure you can handle that?"

"Fuck you," Sajani scowled, finally getting a firm but gentle catch on the shaft.

Anna hummed. "He's going to. Are you a voyeur too?" she smiled languidly and inhaled from my side, her cute nose bumping against me before that feeling was replaced by the small wet feeling of her tongue. She stopped, and looked at Sajani, who was watching owlishly. "Well? Get to work, Jaffery. Mr. Parker has things to attend to."

I could think of quite of few ' _things'_ I had to attend to, but lost sight of them all for a few seconds when Sajani pulled herself close, using me like a fleshy anchor, and impaled her mouth on me. She immediately gagged and Anna laughed at her, and her face heated with embarrassment, but she didn't stop. She imitated Anna with the purpose of doing better, and soon her larger tongue was making large, swift wipes across my crown, unhindered by the fluid spilling into her mouth.

Anna's hands trailed to the underside of me and made a tip-toe step to the part that Sajani could fit into her mouth, which was limited to the head, with difficult. She grabbed her chin slightly and 'tsked'. "You're going to need so much _practice_ ," she said throatily, almost giggling.

Sajani glowered at her, but the impact was slightly lost with her mouth stuffed like a squirrel with acorns. Anna snorted imperiously and did just that. She stuffed Sajani's mouth, summarily telling her what was more important, and then her own. Her mouth found one of my testicles and she sucked in as much as she could, patting Sajani's cheek.

She said something else, but it was mostly indecipherable. I think it was, "Do a good job or you're fired." Contextually, and considering it was said by Anna, it makes sense, because not only did Sajani try harder, but she also vehemently flipped Anna Maria off.

Anna's hand came back to caress the other orb not in her mouth and her free hand was between her legs, moving and patting so insistently I thought she was trying to put out the fire. The wet sound told me that was just impossible, though.

Sajani sucked like I was candy, her cheeks hollowing out and her lips pulling away in a gasping _pop_ before she came back and attacked me with her tongue. Beneath that lab coat was a body I never would have guessed, and her cleavage was distinctly visible, a valley of soft and chocolate cream colored flesh that I had the perfect view of.

She reached a new plateau, another inch. Soft, plump lips slid past insistently and saliva gurgled, but the wider part of her tongue writhed against me as the rest flailed and she gagged, eyes squinting in effort. Her hands, I saw, were doing much the same as Anna, although less vigorously. She obviously found something she enjoyed and trailed her thighs, stopping momentarily to pull back and duck out of her pants, not leaving me exposed to the cold air long enough for it to even matter. Her hand was between her legs after that, less putting out a fire and more fanning the flames of something molten.

She pulled away and placed a single kiss on the tip, and then another, and then three times that, deeper, hotter, heavier and faster. Less chaste and more incensed, desperate and breathless before I pulled away so she could allow her to breathe. Anna had emptied her mouth with a hum and a pop and watched Sajani heave for air with a pleased looking smile, her cute lips turning up into a smug veneer of satisfaction.

"Find something tasty?" She asked, but Sajani didn't answer her. If she did find something tasty, she went back for seconds, her tongue licking me clean like a plate full of sauce.

I wasn't one to be outdone, my recently emerging pride wouldn't allow that. As Anna took to the side, roving her head from side to side, struggling cutely to get more than she could into her mouth, I let my agility guide me and had one hand go to Sajani's cleavage, and the other to Anna's. The soft feeling of their breasts was something I allowed myself to luxuriate in, their nipples so hard they were sliding against my hands like erasers.

I was dense when it came to women, not clueless. I wasn't a virgin, and my history wasn't that barren, just intermittent. I had learned at the very least that, when you're a lucky fucking bastard? Just shut up and be a lucky, fucking, bastard.

My fingers latched on to the sensitive nubbins of flesh on her breasts and I tugged minutely, imagining electric shocks shooting through them both. I wasn't far off. Anna, more used to the feeling, stopped suddenly to enjoy it with a loud, slightly muffled moan, leaning into it as I pulled away ever so slightly, her palmable breasts becoming perky from the strain. Sajani had shivered, one eye went wide and she collapsed against me, her mouth on mine in short order.

Her tongue lashed suddenly and I didn't let up. Twisting slightly, I allowed my spider-sense to move me like I would any other time and her tongue found a slot and filled it as she trembled slightly and found support at my legs. She soon got into the motions with the verve of someone who just didn't care to _wait_ anymore and rocked herself back and forth amateurishly, stuffing her face and reaching a stalwart barrier at the back of her mouth where her gag reflex stopped her every time. The room was silent except for sextuplet of noises – Anna's lips smacking in sucking kisses along me, Sajani's voice moaning and the sound of wet, sloppy saliva stirred by her movement, the wet sound of their arousal, and my own laugh, because, well… It's just _good_ to be me.

By the time she had run out of breath again Sajani was ready for attack in seconds. Her face bumped against Anna's and they fought shortly, pushing cheek against cheek until they apparently reached a pact and took to their own devices on separate sides. Two pairs of soft, dainty hands took in hand what they could; Anna's hand on one half, and Sajani's on the other, 50/50. On one side Anna was intent on licking like she was trying to get paint off the wall with her bare tongue, and Sajani was not far behind. She trailed back up, her tongue leaving a wet streak up my neck in the most lascivious, needing way, looking up at me for approval. She stopped for a moment and licked her lips, smiling and swallowing and wiping her mouth, her steamy breaths nearly muted by Anna as she eagerly took up the slack.

My lips went to her chest, her neck, trailing up to her mouth where she was just as eager, her hands coming up to my face and cupping it to lick the inside of my mouth with unskilled but eager fumbling. Anna was there almost instantaneously, resuming her post, stroking me and positioning me with doubtless intention, and I could feel the molten lips brush slightly against me.

She writhed as Anna did that again, and again, and again. If only she had been just a little more forward about her feelings… I was content to let her write a little, let her simmer and beg for it, which was no doubt Anna's intention. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, and all that. Despite it all, her tongue spilled into my mouth and lashed every part of it with hot saliva and an appendage that seemed almost alive. The other hand was running along my chest, soft digits meeting hard, steel muscle before it was on my face in a lover's caress.

Anna's hissing was so loud it could have been in my ear. She seethed, sucking in air, _"Fuck yes…"_ in the most satisfied manner I had ever thought I'd hear a woman speak under the circumstances, and squeezed as hard as she could, bidding me to move closer. I did her one better. I thrust and met the hard nub that had Sajani's legs twitching insistently as I teased my way from tip to end of her crotch.

I bucked and it was so hot it almost burned, but so wet that it couldn't have been anything but pleasure for the both of us, and Sajani locked her legs around me, wrapping me in plump flesh. I felt the hard nub run along me and seized the opportunity, pulling back and assaulting it teasingly, kissing her most sensitive point with mine that Anna was insistently trying to avoid getting inside her while Sajani's efforts to do the opposite grew stronger. She was rubbing myself up and down against her soaking lips, shivering, her legs going slack and her grip loosening as she tried to bite into my shoulder to quiet the high pitched squeal that lost its voice before it could even start.

I felt something wet, something throbbing, and then she was almost still. She started to buck against me, lethargically but with purpose, and one after another her twitching legs wrapped around me and her mouth was on mine again in a long, desirous kiss.

I felt the smaller hand between us, Anna's dainty fingers cupping me from below and roving me over Sajani's entrance with a front row seat as Sajani found a new favorite game which consisted of sucking on my tongue like something tasty.

"Oh, you're going to make her scream, Slick. Do be gentle," Anna said in a way that said the opposite.

"No promises."

* * *

There is instinct, and habit. Instinct is intuition, habit is something that is built, either bad or good. The latter is hard to kick. I had one good habit forever seven bad ones. Instinct was something that ended up coming naturally. You don't live as long as I do by being stupid and lucky, of course, though luck helps.

Newton's First law is a wonderful thing. It was hard to want to amass any amount of super-strength to stop the encouraged motion of my girlfriend pulling to, and then away from, the molten arousal of the girl who apparently envied said girlfriend as she moaned for it. An inch slipped in and there was plenty more to come, and Sajani was hissing with pleasure, and then effort, her hips bucking up against mine in a tortured pleasure that was quickly reaching a frenzied crescendo. Unbidden, my hand found her hard little button of pleasure, and stuck to it, ran furiously on it just as Anna's did against mine. Sajani screamed breathlessly and went slack against me in orgasm. She fell against me and her legs lost all strength, and her tongue lolled against mine weakly, as if it hadn't gotten the memo that she was out of commission.

Then, like a wake up alarm, my spider-sense rang. It was a bad habit to ignore it.

That's where instinct and good habit come in and I…don't.

Anna took her cue and pulled me away and took as much of me into her mouth, absolutely stuffing her cheeks with mixed juices and something that made the side of her mouth balloon obscenely, looking up at me mischievously that left little wonder as to whether it was her goal. If she minded Sajani's juices she didn't show it and went to town, stuffing one cheek and then another like she was brushing her teeth with a gigantic, fleshy toothbrush with her mouth stretched as wide as it would go and her tongue luxuriating over my crown, valiantly trying to coax out what she'd gladly wear on her face with pride or take it anywhere I'd ask her to. She was drooling profusely and looking up at me with wide, dazed, incensed eyes, but it would take a lot more than that.

She was so incensed I don't think she noticed, but I did. It was as clear as day to me. _Smoke_.

My sense of smell isn't anywhere near Wolverine's, but I pick up a lot of unpleasant things, probably more than a regular human. That's me being modest, I suppose, but I have learned to pick up more, and this was only heightened while giving into the untimely behest of my spider-sense.

The myriad of scents from Sajani's room. A dozen different perfumes clashing with the old canisters of food because she was still a slob. The possibility of them being that fresh made me wonder about the hygiene of the woman I was having a _threesome_ with, but there _was_ no wondering – she might be an utter slob, but I didn't really care at that moment, for obvious reasons.

The smell of exhaust from the city that never sleeps, the heady scent of arousal from Sajani's near comatose body, still twitching with the odd giggle that wracked her form, as well as Anna's who was doing a more than a good job of smearing it over her face as she tried to take me deep, her fingers plunging into her with purpose and her thighs rubbing together enough to start a friction fire.

 _Ring-a-ding-ding Parker, you got it in one. Fire._

Bad habit? Ignoring good things to get to bad things. My love life was filled to the brim with reasons as to why it was so empty, yet chaotic, and this was going to the pile, would I really ignore interaction with the opposite sex, and the _act_ of sex with the opposite sex, to go risk my life for a city that scarcely cared? And without _pay_?

Doing the same while ignoring two beautiful women who, in the furthest extent of the definition, _want_ me? That makes me _certifiable_. Ignoring all of that to get to a _fire_? Idiocy like that just doesn't have a price tag. Anyone dumb enough to buy it, they just giveit away.

...

In my defense, I _am_ at least a _little_ insane.

But I could smell the fire clearly, being so used to being so on guard at all times while swinging through the city and on the watch for trouble. Even Anna's fondling hands couldn't distract me, though she was putting up a good fight. rolling heavy and full orbs like precious golden eggs in her hands as cheeks collapsed in a hungry suck, and through all of this, I hated myself for even allowing myself to be distracted while Anna was getting me deeper and deeper into her throat, making good on a lot of practice she had to call upon and wanting me to take advantage, and I very much wanted to.

Was, wanted, if only. Damn it. I growled quietly, roughly, and nearly inaudible over Anna's wet, sloppy service.

 _Move._

The smoke was like a hit of smelling salts, clearing my senses of lust. Burning wood, fire, acrid and heavy and cloying. My spider-sense continued to blare faintly, as an alarm would when it's far away. Originally it would only work for me and against dangers to myself, but as I got older 'reroute' it with strong emotion. Informing me of people peeping in while I changed into costume, threats to nearby loved ones, people with dangerous intent.

I could tell that the threat, the danger, wasn't near. It wasn't a threat to me, but it was a threat all the same. Someone was in trouble.

There hadn't _been_ any threats recently. My spider-sense would go off, but the inclusion of another hero, Miguel, and at that, another Spider-Man, was like seeing a friendly on a radar that quieted the alarm down with a reassurance that it would be solved. It was right every time.

Miguel can handle it, a part of me said languidly, and I slid further into Anna's throat until she choked a little, and pulled out. I was coated with her saliva, but she was grinning, trailing kisses up and down me and smacked her face with it, sucking on it like a popsicle that she wanted to have melt inside her.

 _I could stay_ here, _and have_ fun, _indulge for once…_

I've been told it's called 'nobility' or 'heroism', but when you have a beautiful woman lavishing you with such single-minded attentiveness that she's willing to take every gooey drop into her core, straight to the stomach, it's called 'annoying'. Fortunately it just so happens that I am a _consummate professional_ when it comes to denying what _I_ want.

Peter Parker had his fun time; apparently, I wasn't done with my work hours just yet. …What if I didn't act, and people suffered? No. What if I _do_ act, and people are saved?

Pat yourself on the back and return to Sajani's apartment. I helped people, because that's what I do, then I can help myself. _But_ , I thought sarcastically just as Anna reared back to my tip and kissed it like the most precious thing, I _would_ miss out on a world class blowjob.

Choices, choices.

I'd be a sad type of man to say that I would rather risk my life than have sex with two women who so want to have sex with me at the same time. Sad and stupid, but I was reluctant and determined at once, and my patented determination can kick the crap out of the other three on my worst days.

I extracted myself from Anna slowly, trying to ignore the whispers of pleasure that urged me to take my time. Her tongue slid past and encircled the head and against the underside as she tried her hardest to hold on with a few more meaningful sucks. Her eyes were half lidded and full of lust, like she was trying to have sex with me using nothing but them and her mouth, and she was doing a _good fucking job_.

 _Focus, Parker._

Grimacing, I pulled away just as Anna was about to take me as deep as she could, which was a little less than a third of the way, and freed myself from a mouth suctioned so tight it made a _pop_ , though I'm pretty sure she exaggerated that. She was licking her lips and wiping her face, taking it as a cue to progress to something more… intimate. Intimate meaning pinning her against the wall and making her scream loud enough to wake up Sajani.

She climbed on the bed and bent over right next to Sajani, pants finally sliding down to show off her plump, fat ass and shook it in the air like it was a target she desperately wanted me to stick, like she really wanted to play _pin the tail on the donkey._ I wanted to play too, I thought mournfully.

 _Fire._ Act, save people. Fire, Parker. Fire is a pretty awful way to go. I would know.

That was just more than enough. Exhaling the lust from my system, I started to attempt to will my own stubborn arousal to go down. It'd be a good time for that determination of mine to pull through.

I pulled up my pants and watched Anna's face screw up in confusion. "Fire," I said simply, trying to look more than a little annoyed. It didn't work, because the thought of leaving someone to die in a fire pretty much had a monopoly on what I was feeling. I couldn't damn someone to such a thing. Well, I could, but I wouldn't feel very good about it. The thought was enough to make me immediately start to soften. I pulled up my pants.

Anna blinked at me once, twice. In the span of five seconds she dismounted the wall and hurried to the edge of the bed, giving me a pleading look, her voluminous rear jiggling temptingly. "You've got to be fucking kidding me. _Please, tell me you're kidding._ "

I looked at her, scandalized. As if I'd ever joke about that. She frowned, sniffed the air, and looked as if she was considering it. I was flattered, she seemed to hold sex with me on the same level as saving other people's lives. Flattered and… more than a little horrified at myself for even considering putting the former over the latter while in a lust induced haze.

Anna groaned and cupped her face, took a deep sigh, and waved at me. She didn't look annoyed, just… pleading, but not annoyed, and that was a refreshing sight. I was experienced with making women annoyed due to my extracurricular and far and away I felt surprised, even flattered, but checked it quickly. I could thank God for an understanding girlfriend later, after I did my best to save someone, hopefully a good person, from dying a horrible death.

"I'll be back," I promised.

Anna huffed and crossed her arms. "And when you do _come,"_ she paused and huffed, "I am _so_ sitting on your damn face for this," she waved, sighing. "Go save the day. And hurry up about it while Jaffery is out cold."

I kissed her, quick and chaste so as to not be tempted, and was gone, my spider-sense ringing all the while. Sadly, it wasn't the first or last time my spider-sense made me run away from sex.

It's all a matter of perspective. Once, I might have cared that I was about to leave a threesome to go jump into God knows what, and maybe if I was a little more clear-headed I would have kicked myself and grumbled all the way to it.

It just so happens that the perspective of a man like myself is decidedly and uniquely… _skewed_.

* * *

 **Deleted Scene**

It took Anna a few minutes to calm herself down before she could extract herself from her crouch on Sajani's bed. Jaffery was, of course, still comatose. The combined effects of being a butterfly grade lightweight and orgasmic on her boyfriend's pole knocked her out soundly, perhaps even the rest of the night.

Anna's eyes then turned to her camera, which was still recording. The red light got her right in the eye and with a huff, she got up and turned it off. Suddenly she didn't feel like watching it, but knew she would later. It wasn't annoyance at Peter for being so selfless, she knew exactly what she was getting into when she decided to stay with him even past his shocking life stories. But horniness nipped at her like an itch that she couldn't scratch, not without him, and she started to collect her clothes.

Jaffery's place was a mess. Anna's face contorted into disgust. It was a good thing Sajani hadn't managed to get Peter to her place sooner, or else she would have scared him off and ruined her chances. Anna couldn't help but find that turn of events hilarious. Sajani Jaffery had a crush on _her_ boyfriend, was jealous of _her,_ and just had an admittedly fucking hot threesome with them, too.

And Anna had it all on camera.

Feeling more chipper, Anna dressed before going to the kitchen in search of some food, though she spared one last look at Sajani. "Since you've been a good sport, I might even clean this dump up for you," she snickered. "But I think I've already done enough for you."

With that, she left the bedroom, only to come back hastily and retrieve her camera, which she caressed like a valuable treasure. Valuable for lonely nights for her, and as something to keep her cackling when Sajani got too uppity, not that she was going to be the only one.

She smirked. This was going to be _fun_.

* * *

 **A/N: For those wondering, Peter is becoming closer in personality to Kaine, and 'Good Luck,' Ben, the Ben Reilly from Spiderverse. A bit crass, but confident in himself. Essentially what Ben had said, "Well I'm Spider-Man, so yeah, I pretty much think I** _ **can**_ **."**

 **And with this, I consider the Parker Industries thing settled. It'll pop up here and there, but will not be the focus of the story. God, that was difficult. So is the lemon powder. I wrote so much and a lot of it didn't even make it, dangit.**

 **I hope you all enjoy your holidays!**

 **Next: FH?**


	6. Chapter 6: FH

**Chapt** **er** **6  
**

* * *

When I say that being burned alive is unpleasant, I speak from experience.

It's no wonder why I had disliked, and still very much do dislike fire – waiting and watching every scrap of your epidermis from your hands to your feet regrow over a period of seven days after suffering full body third degree burns has that effect on you. It is an excruciating affair, especially when full body means 'every scrap of flesh'.

And I do mean every scrap.

And though these thoughts pushed me, giving me intertia where I would have otherwise been coaxed into a state of calm, cool confidence, it wasn't all bad. I had, from being charred to Spider-BBQ, obtained a new sympathy for the supervillains that I recuperated with. The not-so-super villains actually, those down and down D-listers and et cetera that saw it as a hobby.

I had also gained even more respect for Logan, but also more annoyance. Being charred alive might not be either of ideas of a good time, but at least his healing factor can heal him in less than a minute. Mine took me a fucking week.

I was still calm, because a fire was nothing I couldn't handle. If it was started by someone with pyrokineses, I was drowning them, it was as simple as that. History, at least insofar as interrupting my good time, liked to repeat itself, and that wasn't something I would allow to be repeated. My newest suit would make extreme elemental conditions child's play and I scoffed at how long I had returned back to the old red and blues.

'Chase me with a couch in one hand and a chair in the other' is right, I deserved that.

And so there I was, a twenty something vigilante slash CEO slash dead man four-times-over and walking, wrenching open the window of his employee slash coworker slash… friend with benefits (Girlfriend? Sexfriend. crushee)? And I was about to jump into a fire. _This_ is what I think about.

Honestly, if when I was a teenager such a thing would have been outlandish, Now, it was life. Well, the after, after-life.

Swiftly moving toward the window I activated my suit via an innocuous trigger on my wrist before I dove out the window; the suit came into existence beneath my clothes, shimmering slightly - that always looks cool – the benefits of having unstable molecules and closed circuit nanites modeled after the functions of the symbiote, allowing it to come from nothing and recede back to that at my beck and call. Keeping super-duper clothes under your civvies chafed.

Among other addons that I'd make use of were the legs that Otto had used with his suit, though I heavily improved them. While his quick change protocol was utilitarian, and that was something I was quickly becoming a fan of, as it was they didn't quite suit my needs. They were offensive as they were, a love letter to Doctor Octopus, and considering it, I wasn't surprised, just bemused.

Flash-forward to recruiting Oliver Osnick; Parker Industries future, best R&D techie. He'd jumped at the chance to help out the webhead, his old friend and role model who saved his arm from becoming symbiote-chow, even more so when he learned that I was, well, _me_. Ollie wasn't stupid, I'm happy to say, and had easily seen the obvious differences between Spider-Man and 'not-Spider-Man'. This may or may not have had something to do with him almost getting his arm eaten by another 'not-Spider-Man', or the fact that Otto had once been his idol as well.

When given the specifics, he slapped his forehead because the signs were obvious. I'm happy Miguel, Anna, and myself weren't the only ones who thought so.

Oliver apologized profusely, but I held nothing against him. The Steel Spider had retired after the civil war to spend time with his family, specifically his wife, and became a self-defense instructor thanks to his years as a vigilante. Apparently, almost losing his arm was a bit much. If there was one thing I understood, it was that time with family was important, and almost dying had a good habit of putting your priorities in order.

For some people, it took for or five times. Ahem.

With his and Miguel's aid, essentially, we were able to construct legs that responded to my spider-sense; given that it could react to tracers and hijack my reflexes under extreme duress, or guide me in any case, it was my theory, brought on by my spider-sense's peculiar new habit to chime at certain times, that it could do the same for the legs. With a chime of my spider-sense and days of testing and eager work, the theory turned out to be an exciting and resounding success. Apparently, when you get a bunch of nerds in a room and tell them to invent something, they invent something _sensational_.

The legs, designed by Ollie's engineering genius, refined by myself, and test dummied on Miguel, were almost alive under the puppeting of my spider-sense, though it was an enjoyable trial trying to tell my spider-sense what to do, only to realize it intuitively knew what I wanted to do and did it anyway. With effort and repetition their movement became almost as refined as mine, like muscle memory. Like muscle memory however, movements required practice.

Their ability was put to the test as I discarded my shirt. Sleek black legs plucked them from my hands and webbed it up into a neat, compact sack, strands of webbing almost invisible like an actual spider's until it was wrapped over itself; the movements of the legs puppeted by my spider-sense itself, according to my needs, and setting my skull alight with a thrum of activity.

It was like hearing a beautiful woman hum a soothing tune as she sewed with mastery, and for a moment, I thought I saw purple, smiling eyes.

I engaged the stealth function to my suit, not for the first time taking the option to remain unseen as I worked – I didn't need to be seen to help people, and I wouldn't be. Though I had gone on patrol with Miguel, I was invisible, and I was as I jumped from the windowsill, nonexistent by sight and sound and smell. Gravity tried to pull me down jealously but my reflexes kept everything from being a blur as I surveyed the city streets in the scarce moments before I started to fall, having easily cleared the distance from Sajani's apartment building to the one opposite it, and a swiftly fired webline took me even further, over the rooftops.

I offhandedly discarded my pants, the legs bundling them, and I stashed the clothes as I moved, the webbing having been tagged with a tracer from the legs. New Yorkers wouldn't give the Amazing Bodiless-Pants a second glance if they had seen them, however. Not until those same bodiless pants stopped a few crimes.

I would reap the rewards of that; a merchandise deal here, posters there, a small but well received graphic novel. Parker Industries would corner the market on the 'Spectacular Slacks' discreetly.

Clean, efficient usage of weblines had me clearing such an amount of distance that it would have shattered my record of spanning the island in less than three minutes, if I were inclined. A webline from my shooter impacted the awning of a roof that I hadn't even looked at, anchoring itself with perfect accuracy and carrying me as I held on one handed, my body contorting to how my spider-sense saw fit, based on my needs. There was no flourish, no time to impress or to show off, just simple fluidity and clarity and all with the effort of brushing my teeth.

Experience had turned me into a calm machine, moving with efficiency that made my teenage self, and even myself before I had died look like drunken, spastic messes in comparison; if I hadn't perfected webslinging, the only one better at it was myself. While it's not bragging, it is a fact – decades of experience over every single other practitioner there is goes a long way, as does having invented it.

My game face was on now. Probably. Someone was in danger and I could help, _would_ help because, again, being burnt alive fucking _sucks,_ and I was willing to bet that the people in the fire didn't have a healing factor to help them.

After doing what I do, I'd go back to Sajani's apartment, tease her for being a quickshot until she buried her face in the covers, because she was immeasurably attractive when embarrassed, and I'd get to enjoy my after, after-life with all that entailed.

Wealth? Fame? Had one now, very nice, didn't need the other and didn't like it so much. Action? I liked the sound of that. And while I may have begun to warm up to the after, after-life now, I couldn't help but think of that old chestnut, and heard _"The best laid plans of Spiders and Men."_

It sounded like the CEO. It could have been a trick of my mind, but I wasn't about to bet on it.

* * *

I saw the smoke billowing up into the night sky and was at the fire in less time than it took for a frozen waffle to heat up in a microwave, for all the good that did me. It was a big one, and it didn't take the lack of sirens to tell me that something was wrong. I had my tweaking spider-sense for that, and beyond that, a gut feeling refined after years of situations such as this.

Now I was faced with a blaze that roared like a lion in the dark of the night, but there was no screaming, no running, and no yells for help. It was as if the entire building had been evacuated, the phone lines cut.

I released the thin cable of webbing more than a hundred feet up in the air. This area of city had lower rooftops, making it a long fall down. As I descended, I scanned the blaze - it wasn't any different than the hundreds I had seen over the years, and the fire was, at the very least, _not_ sentient.

It's important to take what wins you can.

Because I was more environmentally friendly than most people with super strength, I hit the ground, leaving no sign of impact in the concrete of the roof before I bounded off again. Tax payer dollars and et cetera.

It was likely that the fire was a setup, an attempt to get some dumb hero like kid-me, or someone else, to put their life on the line and get blindsided.

And while Otto had done a great job at making an example out of the last schmuck that tried to single Spider-Man out, one Miguel was doing a spectacularly futuristic job at perpetuating by being fairly unfriendly, it would take someone ridiculously stupid, or ridiculously confident(and thus pretty damn stupid) to set this up. Neither option was a good recipe for their success.

If Miguel had made any enemies that stupid, he would have told me. He trusted me, the kind of trust that can only be built when you fight an entire corporation of robots and security led by the corrupt, future version of the man you model yourself after.

Also, lots and lots of lasers and rogue experiments. And good, bad jokes.

And the only other person working the city with nearly as much frequency as either of us was Anya Corazon, Spider-Girl. That was another bridge burned, and I kept my distance, as did Miguel. I didn't want to know how burned it truly was, but had heard through the webline, and Miguel's encounters with the Avengers, that she was working closely with Spider-Woman who had once mistaken him for me, and while there was a nepotism joke in there, it's beneath me. Puns are not.

However a bitter joke about even _Jessica_ not being able to tell the difference between one Spider-Man and another, yet again, isn't either. At least she was confused by an _actual_ Spider-Man. Technically. One deserving of the title.

Regardless, Anya was better off with Jessica; Anya was a teenager, and though even at a glance I could see the similarities between us, I only hoped that with Jessica's example, she wasn't _stupid_. Jessica was skilled, though I could finally hand her ass to her after inventing my own formidable martial art. She could do a better job than me at teaching Anya if she were so inclined, I thought.

…She _couldn't_ , but Anya was still better off with her. The last Spider-Girl I knew died because of me, and while she was sitting pretty in Heaven, I still wasn't jonesin' for a repeat. Mattie Franklin died because I wasn't there for her. Because I hadn't guided her, because she had a connection to me.

Because I had left her alone… like I was doing to Anya.

Well, damn. Parker, what the _fuck_?

I shook my head. Spider-Girl could get her tutelage from Jessica, as well as the inclusion and protection from the rest of the heroes that I never could, still being one of the outcasts and least trusted even after years of efforts. And Jonah.

A bland and morbid thought entered my mind, since Ben was the best at optimism, Kaine at turning his brooding into outward, reluctant action (the big hearted softie that he is), and Miguel having the market cornered on _scathing_ sarcasm. I was left with being a very, _very_ good cynic and thought,

 _Everyone inside this building could be drugged and/or gassed to sleep and would die a horrible,_ _ **immolating**_ _death._

I didn't want to be a cynic anymore. It's a hard habit to kick.

But if everyone _was_ gassed asleep, I'd save them anyway. _Somehow_. Something involving expending every last bit of webbing, fire-retardant or not. I'd tear out an entire floor and drag it to the street by _hand_ if I had to. There was no question about it. I wouldn't fail, being burned alive _sucks_ , and I would _not_ fail.

Smoke streamed out of the building's upper levels like water in reverse. Someone had to have noticed, they _had_ to. But it was still silent, it was a trap, possibly, and most likely for yours truly at that, and my spider-sense, choosing at _that_ moment to indulge in its new helpfulness, chimed quietly. I _groaned_.

Fires make for good traps. There's smoke, there's decreased visibility, dangerous surroundings, and, also the healthy paranoia that comes after the first five times you fall for them. Myself, I got paranoid after the first, since being a sixteen year old on fire while a fat woman is trying to beat your head in because the Bugle says you're a monster, _while_ you're saving her family from also being _burnt alive,_ is not fun. Nor is being blamed for the fire.

Eventually, when you're facing some _schmuck_ with pyrokinesis, you just start keeping your eyes on the fire hydrant. Some days you bring water balloons or baking soda with you by the dozens. Just in case.

I wouldn't need that now, since, thanks to a healthy bout of occupational necessity, paranoia, and Miguel's organic variant, I had modified my webbing after them as well, giving the formula a much needed retardation to fire and everything 'burny'.

With that I sprinted on the rooftop to the world's largest brownstone oven, outpacing a good make of car for a span of seconds as the world rushed past me. That was when the flashbacks started, but in my life, I don't, and did not, have the luxury of being held back by fear. Despite memories of being in a similar fire flashing through my head with increasing frequency as I was, once again, about to jump into a fire, I kept moving. I may not have _liked_ fire, but the only thought going through my head was, "If I _ever_ fight someone with pyrokinesis again, I am _drowning_ them, or shoving a box of baking soda down their throat. Possibly both."

My spider-sense guided me to one floor in particular and I leapt, unquestioning since that is an awful mistake only the greenest of Spider-Men should make – I was desiccated. I sailed through the air and the building got bigger up to a point before it was just fire, fire, more fire, broken windows, and flames streaming out like water in no-G as they reached for the sky, and also, more fire.

I bulldozed through the window, wood and glass passing harmlessly past me like bits of torn paper, and I immediately flattened to the ground to avoid the backdraft before immediately setting forth again, running through the building. I was feeling quite comfortable, but even with the perks of having a suit that was essentially a big middle finger to extreme conditions were many, I still didn't want to spend a vacation there.

Flames continued to lick ineffectually at the material of my suit, the orange and smoky haze turning the dark red and blues to red and black. I was looking and listening, ready to move. If it was a trap, I was ready for a fight. I was in my element, surrounded by danger on all sides was where _I_ _excelled_ , and the only way this would have a fraction of difficulty for me was if the villain was some sort of sentient fire creature. That'd be new, and it'd be another one to add to the list right beneath sentient water-boy.

But I tempered my confidence. I knew better, of course. Been at this a long time, and I know there is a reason why you should never show Mr. Murphy your hand, why you should never tempt Fate, and why you should never court Death. But do as I say, not as I do, because that last one is something that I tend to do inadvertently, but frequently.

My spider-sense was guiding me, my skull alive with thrums and vibrations that changed from the pleasant, all encompassing hum to something else. A tweaking, a professional whir of activity that distantly regarded the danger as burning wood and warping walls, crumbling banisters, and the omniscient presence of fire. I barely understood what it was saying to me, but I listened regardless and the meanings came to me almost instinctually.

I was the leading human expert, in my universe, anyway, of all things spider-sense, and if my spider-sense wanted to play ball and be partners instead of a puppet and its master, with me being the puppet, that was fine. Lives were on the line and I didn't like the odds of waiting and looking while someone was roasting alive. I needed _help,_ and I wasn't anywhere near above asking my faithful, years-long companion for that help. I wasn't Otto, and even then, in my self-imposed exile, I wasn't alone.

Knowing that screams of agony are like a box of… screams of agony, you get all types, I would have begged. I heard no such screams and that was either fortunate, or horrifying. Begging wasn't necessary.

The team that we are, I closed my eyes and trusted my spider-sense. We were both too old to just look out for me alone. We had grown, been through too much, too many ups and downs. We could do this… somehow.

The sound of the world being consumed by fire drained away and my spider-sense _pulsed_ , a skull wide thrum that opened my eyes on its own merit, and I could _see, sense_ , and _feel_ every inch of the building like a three dimensional radar. This wasn't new, but it was definitely welcomed. I hadn't experienced it since Cassandra had improved my spider-sense for a time. I could do it on my own now and that was fine, great, _fantastic,_ but I wasn't about to look a horse, or a spider-god, in the mouth and promptly put it to good use.

The doors were all open. No footsteps, no screams… the entire building was empty, _evacuated_. Not a single person, the first pass of my eyes said. No people rushing, no one moving.

A rookie mistake is ignoring the spider-sense, but a stupid one is taking it at face value. The spider-sense grows with time, like a person, but nothing starts out finished. I knew better, and I looked harder. The world slowed to a blackout, drunken crawl.

Getting a third person image of yourself and the area surrounding you is strange, but there it was, with every structural weakness and threat that had my spider-sense tweaking like Morse code. There was no time to question it, and in this new, cold calm, its rhythmic activity kept me centered.

The floorboards three floors down were crumbling and weakening, embers flying and greedily feeding on every scrap of fuel for the fire there was. Personal items were lost and fabric burned, and the fire wanted _more_. In such a state, my hairs were set on edge almost instantly and drove my reflexes into overdrive.

A split second later felt like a minute, the world was so slow, and my old friend reacted to the fire as if the spider-sense jammer was right next to me. It was becoming too much. Every weakness I saw, my spider-sense saw extreme danger, and I tried to ignore it all as my spider-sense dialed up from eleven to _fifteen_.

I quashed the sensation and the world drowned out again with my effort, my spider-sense's tweaking becoming muffled, but still highly noticeable. My head started to protest and ache, my spider-sense working beyond my ability to handle at the moment, like taxed, fatigued muscles. I wasn't _ready_ , too much _danger_ , too much _fire_ , and as I started to lose focus, it did too. _It_ didn't want me to become a fried spider or a barbecued man, or a charred other, _again_. It was _worried,_ frantic with activity and working hard and hampering with my concentration.

But the fire was as much of a threat to me as a regular human was, which is not at all, I protested, and my spider-sense _disagreed_ , its ringing as derisive as it was urgent to the idiot teen that had once ignored it all the time, and the man that thought he knew more. But it acquiesced and listened to me as I listened to it. This was a partnership. We were too old to bark orders and ignore each other anymore.

The ringing quieted, but didn't disappear, and the sharp pain in my head dulled significantly. In the fire, there was something else… _keep looking_ , it rang. Just breathe and calm down, Parker. A second or less had passed. Breathe. I looked closer.

Then I saw. The world frozen in flame, and so was my blood, and the only word that popped into my mind as I stared, sounding so much like Kaine, " _Fuck_."

The entire building was _empty…_ save for two people. One was a small bundle crouched behind the door of a closet. Smoke filled the room and they were coughing, shuddering in fear.

The other was the person who set the trap. The silhouette was familiar enough, I'd recognize those hips anywhere, but the way my spider-sense reacted gave me certainty. It read them, read _her_ , as a friendly, but there was anything but friendly about the intent she had. It was a haze of aggression that surrounded her, a hatred of a man, a spider, and the other guy that was both.

I felt shock, bewilderment, a stopped heart.

No one could make me feel those things like Felicia Hardy.

The _Black Cat_ was strolling up to the roof without a care in the world, a burning building left beneath her as she swayed her hips. I could see her as if I was right behind her, the self-satisfied _smirk_ on her face.

It felt like adding one and one together. Felicia was walking away while a child was about to burn to death in the flaming casket of a building.

 _Bonus question_ : What had you been doing a few _minutes_ ago, Parker?

I had been more concerned with getting laid _._

Ding. Ding. _Ding_.

I was too cold to be disgusted at anything, even myself. The fire was _nothing_ now, and instincts paired up with single-minded purpose had me moving, my spider-sense guiding me like a single light in the dark, silent as shock and a mounting desperation took over. I tore through wood and metal, ripped up _wall_ and _floorboard_ like _paper_ , and crashed through three whole _floors_ of burning wood and stubborn pipe like nothing to get to that kid.

A little girl. A scared, hunched over little girl.

When I crashed into the room and wrenched the door off of the closet she hid, she screamed, seeing nothing but a wrathful, invisible force come to drag her into the fire. The door tore through the rest of the building and what remained ended up embedded into the brickwork of another, all pinging to my spider-sense like an afterthought.

Before my eyes was a familiar sight, in hindsight. Spider-Man, busy with his Spider- _stuff_ , notices a child coughing in some unnoticed corner. She looks up at him and her eyes widen and the look in them is so bright and she _smiles_ – it's a foregone conclusion that she's _such_ a good kid. Then she starts to pass out.

The little girl's scream was interrupted by heavy coughing and almost drowned out by roaring flame and crumbling architecture. I disabled the stealth function of my suit and snatched her up, and she saw me. Chocolate, curly hair brushed me in the face.

The world was so _slow_ , my reflexes and everything kicked into overdrive and my spider-sense tweaking like a Geiger counter and as terrified as she must have been, the second she saw me was forever frozen in time. I saw her hair, her face, her smile, so wide and splitting her face with recognition and hope.

History, that big, ugly bitch that it could be sometimes, was repeating itself. Chocolate eyes, chocolate hair. A dirty, sooty face and a look of realization that made her smile like she had just seen her hero _._ Recognition so strong I thought I was dead, because that was the _only_ way I could see it again with such clarity.

To see Leah.

Felicia had a lot to answer for.

* * *

Life loved to throw some pretty dirty punches my way but I had finally learned how to fight, and I _understood_ that Otto _fucked_ a _lot_ of people over after he took _my_ life. I really did. I just didn't care.

I could sympathize, but everyone who couldn't tell the difference between us paid the price of their stupidity by being near him. It was like _Darwinism_ , the supervillain variety!

A wolf in a sheepdogs clothing, and the sheep too dumb to tell the difference? That was almost everyone that Spider-Man knew, and I didn't deserve the headache I got that night.

It was a long night. I dropped the little girl off at the hospital. I was there in seconds _._

If history wanted to repeat itself and score another against Peter Parker it could try, but for every last life I had, I would play a mean defense. I wasn't about to lose a child for the third time. I wasn't about to let someone else lose theirs if I had any say in it.

…The little girl's name was Maya. Of course it was.

I say was, because at some point later in life, she got it legally changed to Arana. God… of _course_ she did.

She was missing her two front teeth, her favorite thing in the world was the hairpin her Uncle had gotten her before he died. Her birthday was in April, _wonder of wonders_ , and her favorite food was chocolate cake with sprinkles - What kid likes sprinkles on chocolate? - which is why she lost her teeth.

She was seven years old. I stayed by her side for what felt like hours, my spider-sense still slowing the world down to a crawl. Torturous, slow hours.

I hadn't seen Death her-his-itself, in a while. If she was standing close by, I was standing guard ready to look her right in her… lack of eyes. She wasn't about to take this child.

She hadn't, and I don't know if it was pity, or something, but I was grateful all the same.

I had felt years younger, and years more stupid. Peter Parker, Spider-Man, had barged into a hospital with a near dead child in his arms, and he was _roaring_ for someone to help. He was just a man, stupidly trying to atone for a mistake he made when _he_ was little more than a child. He couldn't help her, but _they_ could. They had _better_.

Then the money. _What_ could he sell? He's on his own, barely has anything to his name other than a dead end job working for the Bugle. What could he _do_ to make sure this kid lives?

First instinct: adopt her. She likes Spider-Man, adores him. He's _Spider-Man_ and what child doesn't want Spider-Man as a _Dad?_ Take _care_ of her Parker, hang up every thread and web and retire for _her_.

She dies.

The 'amazing' Spider-Man spends a month as a demolition worker. Peter Parker loses his second child and no one is any the wiser. Not the mother of his first, not the woman who raised him, not the people that begin to trust him after so long.

That wasn't about to happen a third time, even if that meant never having children again. I had refused, and didn't care how childish that sounded. I _refused._ History repeats itself unless you learn from it and remember it – _God_ did I remember. I remembered and I wasn't going to repeat myself anymore.

I went to the hospital covered in scorch marks with a little girl barely breathing, curled into my chest. She was smiling, her arms around my shoulders because for some God awful reason, _she_ looks up to me too _._

As calmly as I could, I asked for someone to help her. No yelling, no joking, no repeating myself. I asked once. If no one answered I'd put her in a room myself and do my best, apply what I had learned to help her. My blood was too cold, my heart too still, and the world too slow. Waiting for the reply was an eternity, but if that was what it took I was willing to give it again and again.

A doctor came up and the second the girl left my arms it all rushed up to me, the sound of pregnant silence almost deafening as people stood around wondering what Spider-Man was doing in a hospital.

A police officer tried to stop me as I followed the doctor. They didn't try for long, and I didn't have to _break_ them. I didn't want to, but I didn't really care at that point. After that I watched every proceeding and no one tried to escort me out. Doctors are very, _very_ smart people.

At the end of it all was next to her bed in almost complete silence, save for the beeping and her breathing. I gave them her address, told them to look out for any father, mother, or family that was missing their daughter after a fire, and all the while I was planning. If she had no family I had the money. If she needed _help_ ,I would pay for it out of my own pocket.

See? _I learned._ I could do that now. _Parker_ : 1; _History_ : kiss the spideriest part of my ass.

…

Maya had a family. They had insurance. Her father, mother, and baby brother arrived to see me holding her hand, my mask peeled back to show a tired smile. That was all she could do. Her eyes were open but she was too weak to do anything but smile, and that was enough. It was familiar. Not my daughter, but close. Very close. Too close.

Her father cried as he hugged me, and her mother hugged me as she wept. And the baby boy…Ricardo, of course, smiled this toothless, bright smile, and that felt nice.

I would handle _everything._ I helped back the costs for the reconstruction of the entire building, gave them a new home, anything, per Parker Industries future reputation of being utilitarian and looking out for the little guy. It gave us a good start.

I attended _every_ birthday they had even when people thought I was just a guy in a costume and the kids were too old for that. And though I couldn't understand what the significance of a picture of me was, I couldn't say no to little Maya. The way her eyes lit up when I said yes was the highlight of my night. I still have my photo copy of her smile. It's on my fridge.

* * *

So, day saved. Family reunited. All good.

Except it wasn't.

I crawled through the window of her room and said goodbye. For the hundredth time her parents thanked me, their little baby boy giving me an excited wave with bright eyes. It felt good, and though I can always function without, it helped a lot.

That warm feeling kept my heart from freezing over as I left. My night wasn't over. Little needling thoughts, that patented Peter Parker process, were on me in a _second_. I hadn't seen them in a while and this was not a reunion I was waiting for with bated breath.

 _You could have gotten there sooner._

I couldn't have. A webline from my wrist and I was swinging away, a part of my mask melting back so I exhale tiredly.

 _You could have moved faster. Could have been_ _ **better.**_

I did the _best_ I could _when_ I could, I thought back as I soared through the air.

 _You almost damned a child to death because you wanted to have sex. This is_ _ **your**_ _fault._

I did. I couldn't have known. I have a life too. I can't save everyone.

 _You can try!_

That is a very, very stupid idea.

 _How many people have to lose theirs so you can have yours? You don't deserve_ _ **anything**_ _good. You're_ _ **selfish**_ _, Parker, you always have been. Ben is dead because of you, your_ _ **children**_ _are dead because of you, everyone you_ _ **love**_ _is-_

Oh, shut the _fuck_ up.

This was my problem, and I was _done_ with it. I couldn't have _known_ that while I was busy having sex, some poor kid was stuck in a burning building blocks away. If I had, of _course_ I wouldn't have been getting my dick wet, but I couldn't _be_ _everywhere_ , it wasn't _my_ fault, and I had done the _best I_ could, _when_ I could, and if the world wanted anything more, it could find someone _else_ and kiss my ass!

That didn't make me feel any better. Fortunately, I wasn't feeling any worse. Like I said: "Mean defense."

The thoughts that I was intent on living without returned. _You were getting your dick wet while a child's home was burning down around her._

I was.

 _Burning alive is_ _painful_ _, isn't it?_

It is.

 _You could have been on patrol. You could have been-_

God in heaven, I had done the best that I could, I had _saved_ the day, because that's what I _do_. And I would do it over again, and again, and again. I have a life. I deserve to enjoy it, and I better because my life took me away from my _death_.

I effectively told what remained of Peter Parker's old habits to go fuck themselves. It felt good. I was getting a headache arguing with them, and was extremely close to punching myself in the face.

Happy thoughts, Parker.

…

It was my fault, wasn't it? In some small way, it could have been linked back to me. I'm man enough to admit that. It's the only way to move ahead. I am not a _child._ It was my fault. I fixed it. Problem settled. I still felt no better because the feeling coiling in my stomach was cold, and it was angry.

 _Happy thoughts_.

But it was unsatisfied by a day that was saved. It wanted closure, _vindication._ I wanted to keep moving forward, to look forward to the day I could go home and see my daughters again, my family, but in the meantime to enjoy my new life. It wanted Felicia to answer for what she had done.

The haze over my judgment that used to pop up when it came to those I cared for was nowhere to be found and I had no such compunction to deny what happened. Felicia had done this, I had seen her, felt her, and the only question on my mind was _why_.

Three guesses, first two don't count.

 _Octavius._

Happy thoughts.

Felicia Hardy was not a _good_ girl, but she was a _good_ , _bad_ girl. She used to be. She was a good person at heart, which she _did_ have, and I cared for her so, so much despite our less than close history of her holding me back at arm's length and loving only one part of me.

Two parts of me. …Four.

But she also knew how to hold a grudge, and as preposterous as the prospect seemed to the side of myself that said Felicia _couldn't_ have done it, I connected the dots and saw the picture. Otto had wronged her, and she remembered. And she thought he was _me_.

I could hear Kaine already. "Peter, what the fu-, no, you know what? I'm _glad_ I'm not you anymore, for fuck's sake."

I scoured the city for her. Felicia had laid a trap for me… because she was punched. Because she felt _wronged._ She had damned a child because of all of this _._ All because of _Otto_.

The fact that he was suffering in literal nothingness wasn't a bit of a relief to me. I wanted his bones in my grasp as they crunched. Like he had done to me when he was in my body and I, in his. Like Felicia's nose had underneath his fist. Nonexistence wasn't good _,_ or _terrible_ enough for him.

My anger wasn't limited to one direction. Bitterness rose up in my throat. _Cry me a river, Felicia_. I watched my life get broken down into pieces and my relationships betrayed, my faith in those I trusted my life with not just questioned, but become laughable. She lost some teeth and set a trap for me. Because of _Otto_.

In my tunnel-vision, I don't know when he appeared, but soon I could tell Miguel was swinging beside me, appearing to my spider-sense as a friendly. A single set of _thwips_ didn't do anything to bring me out. Then another, frantic, excited, unskilled. Voices. Miguel and… Anya, Spider-Girl, because who else had organic webbing?

 _Kaine_. Another bridge burned thanks to Otto, and another fan to the flames, and he wasn't coming back. I had yet to find him.

I ignored them, their voices muffled and bickering and unimportant to me, entering one ear and exiting the other. They couldn't hope to keep up with me for long either, though they tried.

I didn't care about anything but finding Felicia. I was knee deep in a cold feeling that froze my core over. Eventually I couldn't hear them, couldn't hear what I realized was them trying to talk to me. They faded from my spider-sense's range, which I noted had gotten larger with use. That was good because I was scouring like a hawk for that one familiar blip, that chirp of recognition, that feeling I got in the burning building. For Felicia. It didn't take long for me to find her. She was waiting.

She could keep waiting.

Experience is a wonderful thing, especially in RPGs. The more you have the closer you are to leveling up. With mine, I was far and away from that green, level 1 Spider-Guy. I knew the score, I knew the exploits and how to play the game. What to do when you get trapped, ambushed, tricked, bamboozled, or _pissed off_. All collected in _Super-Villainy 101: The Spider-Man Edition_.

Now, Felicia had taken cues from that book in spades. _Lesson 1_ : It's a bad idea to go headfirst in _any_ situation, especially without spider-senses, spider-reflexes, spider-speed, and spider-handsomeness, all reasons why I had been hesitant about Miguel and Anya working alongside me. They had no spider-sense and that made everything that much more dangerous. Miguel had accelerated vision and Anya had spider-cuteness, but it's just not enough.

 _Lesson 2_ : Never let the bad guy know you're on to him. Play the fool, the jokester, the buffoon. The drunken barfly or the underdog. Not only does it make it so much easier to get the upper hand against them, criminallyso against those arrogant types, but it makes victory _that_ much sweeter. The look on their face is _hilarious_ and a good meal for your pride, if it's wounded.

 _Lesson 3_ : Stealth. I owned it when I felt like it. No one saw me when I didn't want to be seen. With my suit's capabilities it was overkill, Logan wouldn't even be able to smell me, and Felicia never saw me coming.

She was playing the part so _well_. That smug look on her face as she waited for the hero to show up in a pre-determined place looked almost rehearsed. I could imagine her standing in front of her mirror, naked as the day she was born and proud of her body, practicing that satisfied look.

I was _almost_ marginally impressed. Did she think she was a punch-clock villain? What did she thinkwas going to happen? _Banter,_ and then a commercial break?

I swung by her, pretending to not see her and her smirk grew. I doubled back behind and engaged the stealth functions and watched as the smirk began to fade, giving way to frustration. When she looked around on that lone rooftop, I was already behind her, and observed.

Her hair was as white as it had been but her stance was different, aggressive instead of coy and seductive. Her costume was different: the white, fluffy mane that I'd come to recognize as the Black Cat's signature look was gone, and in its place was a look that sent a different message. Namely, "What is the purpose of having a belt this big?" It went all the way to her legs. She probably tripped a lot with it. Cats are clumsy.

Her cleavage was zipped up by a leather jacket and her fingertips glinted dangerously with sharp claws, so I _knew_ she meant business. I remembered cat puns galore, and had enough of them fighting her future self/clone in 2099.

But for the both of us here, there was no amusement, no fondness, and no attraction. I was angry, at _Felicia_ , and that was _not_ something I was used to. Not when she refused to sleep with me without my mask, not when she sold my blood for her own pockets, never. Because she, despite everything, was good. She cared for me, once. For Spider-Man. This freezing feeling of rage now threatened to consume me.

Never _Felicia_. She had been there for me through so much. Saved my life when she wasn't asked, stood at my side implicitly when no one else would, fought with me when it was far more dangerous for her to than not. She wasn't always this way. This didn't make sense. I was confused, at war with myself. She's _mind-controlled_ , _she's not herself._

She is.

 _You_ know _what that's like. This isn't her, it couldn't be. A clone, a spell, a robot or alien, anything. Don't jump to conclusions, Parker. You know what it's like to be blamed for things you didn't do._

I do. Over a decade of experience for all of that. If anyone is good at doing the reverse of what Logan does, it's me, and I reeled in the anger, closed my eyes, and looked to my spider-sense. Please be wrong.

A negative ping.

For what it's worth, I think my spider-sense sounded regretful. Regretful, but not wrong. Of course it wasn't. Aside from magic mojo, my spider-sense doesn't lie _._ It never lied. It could be a bit overprotective, it could be confused and driven into overdrive where I couldn't understand it, but not now. Not here in this calm, cool, coasting glacier of… anger? Disappointment _. Bemusement_.

It was a whisper that sounded vaguely of Felicia Hardy. Images and history, and as true as the day is blue, it felt Felicia, registered her. So familiar, so right. So wrong.

 _So now what_? I was ready to have _torn_ into whoever used Felicia like this, whoever had controlled her, but not her, not _Felicia._ Never _Felicia._ I couldn't. The thought made me clammy and disgusted. Felicia was _important_ to me, the man who had done this to her was already _more_ than dead, but that wasn't good enough.

All I could do was _wish_ for him to be back so I could crush his balls until he died again, and bring him back so I could do it _again,_ and again, and again. I'd have to settle for hoping he was getting the fattest, prickliest pineapple and evergreen sapling shoved so far up his ass in nonexistence, with a _pitchfork,_ that he'd feel them in his throat.

Felicia's lips curled back in a growl of annoyance. Some of her teeth were gone. Distantly, I surmised that she was likely going to make that a point of contention with me and rub it in my face. _"Look what you've done to me!"_ and so on. Her future-self had done the same thing and Felicia, if nothing else, was always true to herself.

I snarled. Felicia whirled around with a slash, ready to attack at a hair's notice and I stopped her arm in its tracks with a stone-like parry. At the speed her arm was going it buckled and snapped under the force as if it had just whacked into a brick wall and she cried out, but I felt nothing. I couldn't. I couldn't blink, couldn't speak. My hand snapped out and met soft breasts, but there was no pleasure in this. She slammed into the brick wall behind her, the entrance to the building, trying to collect and defend herself and finding nothing but open air.

Waiting for me, waiting to attack me, she was obviously not cognizant enough to recall that I was smart enough to build a suit that made me completely, utterly _invisible_ to both eye _and_ ear. Anger had made her stupid, and anger also makes you incredibly shortsighted _._ I thought Felicia Hardy was better than that. Apparently I was wrong.

Anger had driven the man who used to be Peter Parker to insanity and made him spend years chasing after himself to kill him. It clouded Kaine's eyes and made him _loathe_ Ben. It corrupted the symbiote's… feelings into something that made it _hate_ me enough to terrorize and attempt to murder those I cared about.

What had it made me do? What would it make me do? I wasn't at this point, I _knew_ how to control my anger just as well as my strength. I wasn't _Brock_ , I _learned_ from Kaine, I _wasn't_ Logan.

But then Leah's face flashed before my eyes. Maya. Their looks of adoration and relief and _joy_. The hospital again. One in the cold, one hot. One breathing, one not.

The world slowed, my spider-sense silent, like a lone light and unmoving, but calming. I was _better_ than this. _You saved the day, Parker, again. No surprise, have a pat on the back. Your folks are so proud._

I _saved_ Maya. I couldn't save Leah but that was fine, she was safe, she was happy, she was _waiting_ for me. I was better than this. If I wasn't, I would be. Finally, I was… I knew _better_ … and that made me feel better.

I deactivated the stealth functions of my suit that muted all sound I could make, and as I spoke, my voice was as slow as a glacier and twice as cold. "I am going to give you _one_ chance to explain yourself, Felicia. Just one."

A brief flash of recognition flashed in her eyes before her expression twisted in _rage_. Her foot lashed out in a snap that'd have a professional fighter on the ropes, but it was nothing to me. As slow as molasses and twice as weak.

Her leg hit air, it hit something solid and impacted painfully, for her. Superhuman durability can be a right bitch to stupid, angry people, but stupidity is its own punishment. I shook my head. "Alright then. _"_

I wasn't about to let this escalate. Felicia cried out but was cut off by the webbing that hit her square in the forehead, knocking her back with the force of a thrown billiard ball. A following ball of impact webbing hit her in the arm, expanding on impact and dragging her straight to the wall from force alone. She smacked into the brick wall, reeling.

I briefly and clinically inspected her leg, but my spider-sense knew it wasn't broken. I knew, too. Felicia was too skilled, too experienced, to not know how to roll with her kicks. She was obviously too angry to care, though. It was injured, but not broken. I could see the flash of doubt on her face. Was this a good plan?

Hm… _No_. Any super-villain out there who involves children in their plots might as well sign their ass over to me, because I will be one of the first in line. It _wasn't_ a good plan, and Felicia Hardy was obviously no exception, her relationship with me would be of no help, and she was starting to realize that.

Felicia made a valiant effort to acrobatically swing up the wall and wrench her arm free, testing the durability of the webbing and finding herself wanting. The webbing looked unimpressive, simple, and delicate. It was faint and only now that it was in a wad of impact webbing did it look tactile, but my webbing is a lot stronger than people give it credit for - it doesn't get ripped like paper by anyone but the _really_ damned strong, and it was only stronger now. Its adhesiveness is just as good, and unless Felicia had enough strength to tear the bricks from their very foundation before she tore her muscles trying, she was stuck and done.

She tugged and wrenched and yanked and pulled until finally she tired herself out. I watched her fall gracelessly, what finesse she could muster leaving in the face of her injured leg. She fell as a heap, her leg buckling with a cry of protest that almost gave me pause as she tried to get back up, stubborn as always.

I had missed her. Had. All the while she looked ahead through the mess of her hair, air blowing through the gap in her teeth and nose like a bull in a red room, forcing me to acknowledge just how our reunion was going, and why.

She thought she was looking at me, but I wasn't there. It was second nature for me. Felicia could snort all she wanted but I was shaking my head in disappointment. Not at myself, at my luck, but at hers. At Otto Octavius, for all the good it did me. Atlas can rage against the world for its injustices all he wants, but it means nothing until he shrugs. I shrugged.

"I'm right here, Cat," I said softly. I deactivated the stealth function and my suit sprinkled into existence like water. She whipped her head to me and glared anew, but that look of surprise on her face that preceded this did not add to the 'super deadly femme fatale' look.

" _You," s_ he seethed. I'd have been surprised by her vehemence if I felt like caring. I could have been five inches from her face and she could do nothing. Past that, I was too cold, frozen with a cocktail of apathetic emotion. At everything and everyone. All because of Otto.

"It's me," I said. The voice of the CEO was there. Dry, sarcastic, caustic, and patronizing. I reveled in it because it kept me stable, even though it was another thing on my plate. "And you're here. Would you like to know why?"

"Because history has a way of repeating itself," she spat. "Come to bag the villain again, Spider?"

"Oh, you have _no idea_ about history," I snapped, the ice cracking for only a second.

A humorless laugh left my throat, sounding a little manic. There was a joke in there, about me being a teacher. I ignored it. "I'm here because of _you_ , Felicia. Because you set a trap for me. Are you thinking about a change in career?"

She seemed to smile a smug smile, but it was crinkled and twisted into a toothy sneer that showed just what had happened to her teeth. Her look was just as bemusing as Carnage's maw and I stared her down all the same.

"Poor little spider, always so _gullible_! Can't help but play the _hero_ , can you? Turn in the big bad _criminal_ ," her voice sweetened to a sultry tone, as if she wasn't were she was, toothless and twitching with ferocity. "And you _fell_ for it."

She laughed bitterly. She was trying to get under my skin. It was Felicia, alright. In the future she had done the same thing. She had twisted my emotions and tortured me with them, with my guilt, and _got off_ on it.

At the moment, I questioned my taste in women. Still, that Felicia then, and this Felicia now, forgot who exactly they were dealing with. Being an industrial grade irritant is my _trademark_. Now all I wanted to do was make her feel stupid and the only one she had to blame was herself.

" _Bravo_ Cat, you've copied just about every fledgling super-villain who wanted my attention there _ever_ was. You're _just_ as successful. Welcome to amateur hour, Felicia. Don't let the door hit you on the way out and make sure not to quit your day job."

She thrashed against the bindings. It was my turn to sound sweet. " _Oh_ , too soon?"

I watched her go back to that snarl again with a cold gaze. "It's _pathetic_ , really. What did you plan to _do,_ Felicia? You never _could_ beat me, Cat. Did you plan to sneak up on me? _Kill_ me? Is that what this is?" I wrenched her hand up and shook it, the sharp metal claws at her finger tips glinting like knives in the moonlight. "Are _you_ a big, _bad_ , 'super-villain' now?" I repeated with all of the interest someone would give a dimwitted child, the CEO's voice overwriting my own. "Did _you_ want to get caught by the big, bad, Spider-Man, _too_? Poor, poor _Kitty-Cat_."

That set something off in her. She thrashed and writhed in vain at the restraints, screeching. "You _ruined my life_!"

" _Join the club_ ," I hissed, to her confusion. I got in close, uncaring, my voice quiet. "You set a building on _fire_ , Felicia," I said softly, quietly, before I _snarled_. "There was a _CHILD IN THERE!"_

For all it does, anger is a fair-weather friend. Rather than letting it blow me up like a car in a drag race, I obtain far more satisfaction in reigning it in and letting it out in controlled bursts, otherwise then it's gone, leaving behind regret, a broken vehicle, and me feeling stupid.

Felicia had never seen me yell so loud, and I hadn't done so in a long time. Not since Mattie, Cassandra, and Kaine's death. My voice was tested and my throat protested. It was soon _raw_ , hoarse, and stripped dry from the air that left my lungs. I could hear it echo and reverberate and birds fluttered off in the silence that followed. She flinched, suddenly aware of the fact that her being restrained and my being significantly _unpleased_ was not good for her.

I like to think it took some of her stupid away, but it was probably fear. A scaredy Cat was fine too.

She blinked dumbly and frantically at me, trying to edge away but the webbing wouldn't let her. I backed away and started to pace. "Third floor, closet of her bedroom," I said softly. My foot impacted into the roof, breaking through it like it was a corn chip. "A little girl _cowering_ in there while smoke flooded the place. Because of _you,_ Felicia."

I didn't think Felicia was a monster, just stupid. To see her eyes widened in horror brought me a perverse satisfaction that was in no small part relief. _"No!"_ She screamed. "I evacuated the building, I _couldn't, I-"_ she shook her head and snarled at me _, "It's_ your fault! Y _ou made me do this!"_ Her following sob of regret made me too pleased for it to be comfortable. _"No."_

I could have eased her conscience, but I didn't. I clapped instead, feeling too much like the CEO himself to not acknowledge that I had, if only for the moment, become him, and I had no qualms about that. "Bravo, Felicia. You've gotten another super-villain accolade. Collateral damage; you've condemned an _innocent_ to death. I am _so_ proud." I sighed, and she flinched away, shrinking into herself pathetically.

"And I am thoroughly _disgusted_ by you _._ What the _fuck_ is wrong with you?!" I roared. " _She could have died, Felicia!"_ She looked up at me, recognition in her eyes. Her breath hitched. I smiled a rictus smile that she couldn't see. " _Yes_ , Felicia, while playing the hero, I saved someone's life. Because that is what _I_ do," I sneered.

She gulped, her eyes darting. "I didn't see- I didn't, couldn't know, I-"

" _Why_ , Felicia? Why couldn't you?!" I asked breathlessly. I was pacing furiously, taking my anger out on the brick wall behind her. Underneath my fist a good portion of the wall went flying, gouged out and discarded like a house of cards. "Because you were angry? At me? Because it 'was my fault'? Fucking explain _that_ to _me_ , Felicia. You set a building on fire to get _back_ at 'me'? I know 'a woman scorned' is a popular saying, but this is _bullshit._ "

Felicia said nothing, and looked down with all of the realization a child has when she realizes that she has _fucked up_. I heaved, my nostrils flaring behind the mask and ground my foot so hard into the roof, but it ended up gouging through concrete and I tore it out and kept walking.

Don't take it out on her, Parker, never her, never _Felicia_. _Felicia_ wouldn't have done this. Not the Felicia I knew. _Never_ the Felicia _I_ knew.

…Right?

The thoughts came back, smug and annoying as always. _This is all your fault, anyway._

Oy vey. Mother Mary, Dad, Uncle Ben, everyone.

"You _betrayed_ me," she whispered eventually, swallowing. She looked up and I could see tears streaming down her face profusely, eyes glistening and her face stuck between a twitching, weak snarl and seconds away from crumbling into a full on weep. "You _betrayed me."_

The look on her face isn't one I'd ever forget. Heartbreak. It's what reminds me of what she must have felt. I didn't want to care, or see that, at that moment. She had _no_ excuse. None. _This_ wasn't myfault _._

But if it was, I'd own up to it. My responsibility to keep moving forward.

"No, Felicia," I said, my voice soft and quiet. I reached to take my mask off. Cold air greeted my face and I held it limply in my hands, but it ended up falling anyway. "I could never betray you."

As she sucked in breath, I could see the memories coming back to her.

* * *

With as much as I learned, it was a given that I had done some _dumb_ fucking things over the years. It's understandable. No onetaught me, guided me, or helped me, I was on my own from the get go and out in the cold for years. No team or anyone to rely on, no one trusted me. I won't complain because it won't do me any good.

Those times are behind me, but revealing my identity to the world was one of the _dumbest_ things I had ever done, and it was the result of being taken in by a teacher. Peter Parker loved that, he finally had someone to look up to. As it turned out, I was better off by myself.

Parker, I had learned, could be known as the famous professional fighter; the Bombastic Bag-Man who was beloved by New York; Ricochet, the man who obtained the key to the city and was the adopted son of J. Jonah Jameson; Dusk, the man who the police called for help in hostage situations; all of this in _any_ other universe where Spider-Man didn't exist.

But Peter Parker, Spider-Man? The worst thing he could do to himself is let the world know he was Spider-Man, the vigilante. Kind of unfair, really, but I won't complain. I could still hear the CEO say, " _The one, the only, accept no substitutes."_

Revealing myself to the world was one of my greatest mistakes. It put a target on everyone from my friends, some who turned their backs on me, to my family, to people I barely knew, to even the children I had taught. It was a mistake so great, in fact, it took magic to roll back the clock.

Doctor Strange was there for me, though, and it was that event that cemented my belief, my full on commitment to magic, _Harry Potter_ jokes aside. Strange didn't just turn back the clock, he made it so that _no one_ remembered who Spider-Man was. He _folded_ the timeline on _itself_ , because being the _Sorcerer Supreme_ is more than just a fancy title. Spider-Man's identity faded like marker on a whiteboard, there one moment, gone the next.

Only, it came with a caveat because _causality_ is a very big bitch. My abilities that came from the _Other_ , I noticed afterward, were gone, and if anyone close to him ever came to the conclusion that Parker was Spider-Man, they would remember everything, like poking a hole through several folded pages in a book, seeing everything in-between.

Before I died only a few people found out – the Fantastic Four and Carlie Cooper, who had been so angry that she dumped me. Talk about self-centered _._

There was a distinct look that accompanied this experience. A blank face for several seconds, then a blink, every time. If there was a sound to accompany this look, it'd be closer to the sound of glass opening. Felicia was experiencing it all.

She jumped in surprise as if a window just broke in front of her face. Her face twisted up, halfway caught between a smile and an absent that gave way to a confused sob as reality set in. She bit her lip. Hard, so hard, in fact, I could see the pearl of blood slowly start to stain what teeth she still had. I hissed – that was something I was already planning to fix.

Felicia's voice was breathless. _"_ Peter _?"_ She asked, her breath hitching.

The night came rushing up to me and I felt more tired than I had in a while. My shoulders slumped a little, and my face felt like stone. "Nice to see you, Party-Hardy."

Her eyes flit back in forth, at first in disbelief, then recognition, and finally recollection as, I suppose, every memory we had of us together with no masks or barriers began to play back for her. They did for me too, but I was far too tired for it. I rolled my eyes at how shallow she had become, or had _been_ , if she never knew me. Without the intimacy of knowing Peter Parker, Felicia had regressed into the catburglar I had met years ago. There was no growth, she hadn't changed.

I severely doubted that knowing me was that important because I didn't think I was that influential, but one thing was for sure: out of the two of them, I preferred the Felicia who knew _me_ , and not just the webhead _. She_ never would have done this. She was smart, kind, loyal to death, and a bad good girl rather than a good bad girl.

Then I realized that her pain could have been amplified. She knew and felt it was me now, and still had the bitter rage and resentment fighting for dominance, telling her I had _betrayed_ her. That I treated her like trash, like a common criminal, and left her behind after _everything_ we had been through.

Peter Parker and Felicia Hardy against the world? Fuck that, he didn't need her anymore. He _abandoned_ her because she was _useless_.

I put a stop to that line before it could hurt her any further. Anger fought with compassion, the former disgusted me while the latter annoyed me, yet I still made my choice. I knew better. I knew Felicia. _This_ Felicia. I was tired, and sounded so old to my own ears I wondered if I had turned into the CEO. It'd be an interesting change of pace.

"Skrulls, _clones_ , robots, mind control; _alternate universe counterparts_ , the Chameleon, not to mention _imposters_ ," I drawled. "All ways of taking someone, replacing someone, and impersonating someone. And you didn't consider a single _damn_ one of them, did you?"

"How could I ever?" She snapped. "I _loved_ you, Spider! Do you know how it feels to be _betrayed_ like that?"

I scoffed. Gwen Stacy, Mary Jane Watson, Betty Brant, Sara Bailey, Carlie Cooper, hell, even Felicia minutes before. I was so _sure_ it couldn't be her I questioned the integrity of my spider-sense. "Yes, I do." I said gently, my voice tired. She quieted. "I know _exactly_ what being betrayed and _abandoned_ feels like, Felicia. How it feels to be let down."

"Then you can understand _why_ I-"

"No, I _can't,"_ I said patiently. "I can't understand how you could be so monumentally _stupid_ that you would-"

"Because _I_. _Love. You_." She spat. Felicia had always been passionate, but it still wasn't clicking for me.

I took a deep breath. "Then you should have _trusted me._ " I winced inwardly, it was hardly her fault. It was mine. If she had known, had the presence of mind to consider that Peter Parker would never hurt her like that, then she would have considered. …Right?

Right.

Right?

I had made a mistake that I _corrected_ , the lives of every person I knew were on the line because of _me_. From old classmates to the _children_ I oversaw. Having Felicia Hardy forget Peter Parker was a price I was willing to pay, in hindsight. At the time, what Parker wanted wasn't important. His woes could take a backseat to my 'great' responsibility.

The thought brought up blaring questions in my mind, loud as alarms. Felicia had an excuse, and a damn good one. The Felicia Hardy who knew _me_ and not one half of me would put her life on the line at the drop of a hat for me, for almost anyone. She gave up thieving, became a hero for hire, for me. _Because_ of me, because of _all_ of _me_.

But what about the Avengers? They knew me _just_ as well. They fought alongside me and I _trusted_ them despite years of a sterling lack of reciprocation _._ I still did, butmy _mistake_ lay in thinking that I could _count_ on them, that my faith would go unquestioned. Wasn't knowing Spider-Man for years well and good _enough_? Did they need to know Peter Parker intimately _just_ to tell the difference between _Octavius_ and Spider-Man, or that something was wrong _?_ Because heaven forbid Steve Rogers turned out to be a sleeper agent for HYDRA, or Thor an agent of Ragnarok.

At that moment I was a lot of things, tired most of all _._ I was heavily, helpfully reminded that I was surrounded by _idiots_. This, of course, reminded me that I had not one, but two women waiting for me elsewhere, and that now all I wanted to do was sleep.

"Love makes you do stupid things," Felicia said quietly. I agreed wholeheartedly. "I thought, I _knew_ … Knew that you just… _You_ , whoever that was, _he_ _left me there._ Treated me like I was nothing but a thug, like everything we went through was _nothing_ , like I wasn't _good_ enough _."_

 _Otto_.

I sighed, and let the last of the anger fall enticing whispers of vindication trailed at me like a lover's embrace and I wanted all of it. I knew I should want none of it, and forced them away. Anger was a real bitch and it turned on me, assaulting me with guilt.

This was all _my_ fault, after all, right? If Felicia had known-

No, Felicia had absolutely zero interest in Peter Parker, such had been our relationship. It was back to our beginnings. She had only cared about Spider-Man since the wipe. Getting his attention, making him jealous. I couldn't have told her if I wanted to without her reeling in disgust and leaving.

That does just as much wonder for a guy's confidence as being forced to have sex with the woman you _loved_ while wearing a mask. To say I had been disillusioned is putting it lightly, and to say I questioned my taste in women, again, is right on the money.

"And now?" I asked as I moved to sit down in front of her.

Her eyes narrowed. "I want to know who it was so I can rip his _goddamn dick_ off," she said dangerously. _There_ was the Felicia I knew.

She smacked her head against the wall in what had to be painful, but she took it as punishment, and I stopped her when she tried to do it again. "A _child_ … God, what was I thinking…"

She couldn't even meet my eyes. Her shame was a palpable, visible thing and it shrouded over her like a miasma. I knew the feeling and didn't care for it in the slightest. Now, just as she had gotten her memories of our time together back I had relived them, and seeing her like this wasn't fun _,_ but I was able to see past that and know that Felicia had messed up _royally._

"You must think I'm an idiot." She said, so full of remorse that my heart hurt.

"An idiot doesn't even begin to cover it," I said. "I could make a list of what I think of you right now, Felicia." She flinched back, ashamed, as I had just slapped her, and I pressed on. "You could have killed a _child_. Fuck that, you could have killed anyone, because you were so _angry at me._ Because you _loved_ me? I don't want to be able to _do_ that to you, Felicia. I don't want to be able to do that to _anyone_ , _"_ I said, but so far I was going three for three for driving women crazy enough to hurt others – a symbiote, my ex, and an obsessed student who stalked me before the wipe. I have that effect of women, apparently. Joy.

Tears freely streaming down her face, she tried to bash her head against the wall again but I held her head and forced her to stop and stared into her eyes. All I wanted to do was hug her and tell her it was going to be okay, but a hug and sweet words wouldn't change anything. Maya could have been _burned_ alive because Felicia felt scorned. Because her love crossed the line over to hate.

Primal weakness against fire aside, the _symbiote_ hadn't done that, though it wasn't much better. The symbiote targeted my loved ones, innocents, and Felicia's machinations had caught an innocent.

I shook my head at the thought of what two of my exes could do together. Spider puns, cat puns, and rough, needy sex, considering. Nothing that couldn't be solved by very, very loud music and a bag of shiny jewelry I'm sure.

She sniffed and looked so pitiful, so heartwrenchingly ineffectual that I was captivated. I saw that look in her eyes. That one I hadn't seen in what felt like years. When she knew _me,_ when she let me get close enough and wouldn't let me go, because I was her hero. It had felt nice.

"You know," she began, voice quivering and her smile twitching like she didn't know how to, "I wanted to make you proud. But me, a hero? Like _you_? Who was I kidding?"

She closed her eyes. "And then one day I wake up and I can't- I couldn't remember _who_ you were it was like a dream that never happened and- and that all just _shattered_." She huffed. "I guess that was you?" She asked, giving me a wry look.

"Responsibility is a _bitch,_ Party-Hardy," I returned and smiled, though it barely met my eyes. We laughed all the same.

"Peter, I thought you had… God, I don't know what I thought. It's just… _you_ changed my life and made me want to be _better,_ and then _whoever_ that was made me feel like I was _nothing_ but the worst. Like I had _deserved_ it and everything else was a lie."

I rested my chin on her head and breathed deeply, clenching my teeth so hard I wondered what would crack first, my jaw or my molars. I wrapped my arm around her and rocked her back and forth for what felt like minutes in nothing but silence and she freely wept into me. I had the presence of mind to rip off the webbing from the wall without effort, the legs doing their part to disintegrate the webbing on her person, and her arms wrapped around me like a lifeline.

"You don't deserve that, Felicia." I said quietly. "You never did, and I never could… _I_ never could."

But she heard nothing, and I knew that if I ever saw Otto Octavius again, I was going to make it last. "I'm sorry, I am _sorry, so_ sorry _. Sorrysorrysorrysorry…"_

I could hear the telltale thwip of a webline in the distance, and then two sets of feet hit the ground on the rooftop. My spider-sense chimed like a doorbell at their arrival. A feminine voice let out a gasp of shock at, what I guessed was the rooftop, or me. I'd done damage. So much for being the environment-friendly superhero.

I watched as Miguel O'Hara and Anya Corazon froze, but didn't move. _"_ I know," I whispered to Felicia. "I know." I closed my eyes. It was turning out to be a long night.

* * *

 **A/N: Should there be a warning for sad, or no?**

 **If you can't tell, I love the spider-sense. A lot. The spider-sense is your friend, and silent, serious Spider-Man is my amazing.**

 **Also, Felicia... Her early traits were never something I like, but I work with what I'm given, though I'm not above cherry picking. I don't _like_ cherries, though.**

 **I'm still shaking my head at what she did, and then there's _Silk..._ Oh boy.  
**

 **I hope you enjoyed!**


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